


Little Blob Lost

by InterNutter



Category: Star Trek: Deep Space Nine
Genre: Alternate Universe, F/M, crackfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-31
Updated: 2013-05-31
Packaged: 2017-12-13 12:54:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 34,105
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/824524
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/InterNutter/pseuds/InterNutter
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Odo had never been able to leave the Bajoran Center for Science before the Cardassians left Bajor? What if the Cardassians fought harder on the way out?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Little Blob Lost

Disclaimer: I own nothing but this fanfic. Please nick it not.

ObInfo: Alternate Universe Malarkey(tm) - what if Odo had been in the centre for science a lot longer than the time frame we're used to?

Little Blob Lost  
InterNutter

Odo froze as he crept through the rubble. He hadn't expected voices, nor the noise of people trying to dig through the wreckage for survivors. From the way he'd seen passers-by shun the place, he would have easily believed that ordinary Bajorans would have rather let the whole thing grow over before sifting through it.  
Or maybe they needed the bricks.  
Either way, they interfered with his current escape plan.  
They were getting closer.  
He needed to think fast.  
Odo found a plausibly large cavern and shapeshifted into a humanoid shape. Smaller. Childlike. He'd find out soon enough if they were harmful to him, that way. Play smart. Act dumb. That was the key. He draped himself artistically in the wreckage to make himself appear pinned, closed his eyes and waited.  
Tractor beams hummed overhead and a giant chunk of formerly-wall lifted away as if by magic. The sun was a miracle on his left foot. Hands lifted away smaller chunks of rubble.  
"We got another one," called a voice nearby as more sunlight streamed onto him.  
Odo let himself moan. Once.  
"Alive," amended his rescuer. More tractor beams and hands and finally, with amazing gentleness, they pulled him out, too.  
Odo opened his eyes, feigning shaky consciousness as the woman juggled him into her arms.  
"You're all right, now. It's going to be all right."  
"Who?" he asked. He wanted to remember this woman's name.  
"I'm Kira Nerys. What's your name?"  
"Odo."  
"Just Odo?"  
There was no way he would use his full alleged-name. Half of 'nothing' was better than the whole word. "Just Odo."  
She carried him past an array of shrouded bodies. Large and small. Odo wondered if there was anyone he knew under those cloths. Their troubles were over, anyway.  
Bolts of cloth stretched between poles to give shade to a busy area where Starfleet uniforms bustled amidst the chaos. Some worked on the injured in a kind of processing line. Wounded sat on mats and waited for the quicker bustlers to see to them.  
"Almost there," said Kira. "We'll just get a doctor to look you over and--"  
The word 'doctor' terrified him. He struggled in her grip, tried to wriggle away. "No doctors! No doctors!" He didn't want to hurt her. She was trying to be nice. But if doctors ever knew what he was, then he'd never see the sun again.  
Kira slowed, but didn't stop. She held him close, and gently, and tried to soothe him. "It's all right. I promise they won't hurt you. I'll be with you the entire time."  
"No! You mis-understand..." he could see how she could. "They'll put me away again. I'll never see the sun..."  
"I won't let them," said Kira.  
And by then, they were in the organized chaos of the triage tent. A human doctor, a lieutenant so young it seemed like he wasn't old enough to shave, appeared out of the melee. "Hello, there. Did you hurt yourself trying to help the others at the ruins?"  
Odo could only stare at the medical tools so negligently held in his hands. He breathed more rapidly to cool himself. He did *not* need a panic-induced body-freeze at this time.  
"We dug him *out* of the ruins," said Kira.  
"Ah. That explains the belonophobia." He put them down, unactivated, on a handy surface. "It's all right, little fellow. I'm just going to check you over. Make sure you're not hurt."  
"And you can hold onto my hand," Kira offered.  
Odo took a death grip on her arm. Kept an unblinking stare on the doctor. And for the first time in his life, prayed to the Prophets that nothing would cause him to go back into the dark.

Kira sighed and let the boy cut off her circulation. She'd seen stories like this so many times it almost made her ill. Children living a life of terror and pain for so long that they distrusted genuine help when it came.  
He spent so much of his energy watching the doctor that he didn't see her open the tricorder, silence it, and start a discrete scan.  
Poor boy.  
Bashir the boy doctor found no broken bones, nor any sign of internal injuries. He did wink when he glanced at the tricorder. A human sign of secretive goings-on and shared conspiracy.  
"There," he announced, "All done. You're free to go."  
"You're lying," Odo accused. "This is some kind of ruse."  
Kira picked him up. "No ruse, kid. I've got to place you in the safety zone with the other kids, okay? There's others around who need my help."  
"But--" said Odo.  
"I'll be back to check on you later."  
Through a maze of tents and demountables, and into a hasty fence, where an improvised playground surrounded the shack that currently passed for a school. Four or five vedeks kept watch over the flock of babbling children.  
Odo was a rarity in that crowd. Not because of his odd, flat features, but because of his uninjured state.  
But then, the ones that didn't have physical injuries often had deeper, more secret hurts in their minds.  
He clung close when she placed him inside the fence. Wary amongst strangers.  
"A newcomer, eh?" the Vedek closest to them was a frail old relic who relied heavily on a staff. Kira had forgotten her name. "Don't be shy, little. Let me 'see' you." Gnarled hands reached for him, found his ear. She gasped. "So *strong*... You're a hidden light, little. You should be bought out to shine for all."  
For the first time since the med tent, Odo's grip on her arm slackened. "You're not being deceitful..."  
"Why should I be?"  
"Most people I've met have an agenda."  
She nodded understanding. "Oh yes. Many do, many do. I prefer optimism, though. One must allow for the chance of genuine benevolence, eh?"  
"Huh," scoffed Odo. "Pessimists are rarely dissapointed."  
The Vedek laughed. "Good. I've missed a lively debate. Let's sit and talk, little."  
Kira faded back out of the enclosure. Back to work. She'd visit at the end of her shift, of course. Make sure he was adjusting.

The fence was not tall. Anyone with half a mind to escape could... yet none did. Odo could have literally slipped through with barely a thought. But all he gave it was a thought, because Vedek Kattiu was a brilliant store of information, patience, and wily debate. And inside they just *let* him have access to Starfleet computers and independent research.  
Starfleet knew less about the Denorios Belt than Bajor, especially around the time Odo knew he'd been found. Still, interesting side-links had him delving into space travel, history, and other cultures as fast as he could call the information up.  
Someone was staring at him.  
Odo turned to look. Another injured youth.  
"Your face is flat," said the spectator.  
"Your face is covered in bandages. So?"  
"What happened to it?"  
"Nothing. What about you?"  
"Cardassians," he said, as if that answered everything.  
Odo nodded. He understood their casual cruelty all too well.  
"You from the research centre?"  
"Recently," Odo allowed.  
"I heard they were making weapons in there," said his bandaged interrogator. "That's why the spoon-heads blew it up."  
"I wouldn't know. They didn't let me see much."  
"I heard they had something in there that could change its shape?" said the boy. "And they were training it? To be like an assassin? So it could go anywhere and look like anyone or anything? Did you see that?"  
The truth would cause a riot. "I didn't see any assassin training going on," he said. "For the most part, they kept me in a lab and tested chemicals on me." Hm. Anatomy. How the bits inside fit together.  
"Huhn," said the boy. "Wish I knew where that shifter was."  
"Why?"  
"I'd hire it to get the Cardies that got my family."  
Odo found himself looking at the child again. "I don't think that would be a very good idea."  
"Why?"  
"It..." _shit_ "It can't have been very good as a weapon."  
"Why?"  
"Spoon-heads lost, didn't they?"  
The boy grinned. He was missing some teeth. The injuries lined up in Odo's mind with the butt of a Cardassian phaser rifle. They must have left him for dead.  
"Jes," said the boy.  
"Odo," said Odo.  
They shook hands. "Did they tell you where they got you from?"  
"The Denorios Belt," said Odo.  
"No, I mean your home world."  
Odo went still. "Nobody knows that. I was... found. In some floating wreckage. That's all anyone knows."  
"Wow," said Jes. "Pretty tough."  
Odo shrugged. "I learned to survive. Didn't we all?"  
A different Vedek struck a small gong. "Attend, please. We will be moving on to planned study in a few minutes. Finish up your work, and then activate your assessment programs."

"Major Kira!"  
Kira only looked up from her work in the rubble chain. It was the young doctor from the med tent. She acknowledged his existence but did not pause in her efforts.  
When he fetched up, he was slightly out of breath. "Major Kira... I need to have a word."  
She didn't stop passing bits of rubble along the line. "Talk. I'm listening."  
"I... don't think this is news for everyone's ears..."  
Kira sighed, flagging down another passing civillian to take her place in the line. When the ballet was finished and she was walking away, she said, "So talk. What's so flakking important?"  
"It's Odo." He pre-empted her next, panicked question with a quick, upraised hand. "He's not carrying any infectious diseases. Relax. The thing is, I finished analysing the scans and... he's a silicon-based life form."  
Kira made a face. "Silicon?"  
"It's too early to tell if he's a construct or an actual member of a species that somehow got lost, but... given some of the talk going around about secret weapons..."  
"You thought it wise to keep an eye on him." Kira nodded. "If he was a weapon, we'd all be dead, Doctor."  
"Or... he hasn't detonated yet." He sighed. "I sent Ensign Relleu to take some silicon-based foodstuffs over to him. Given his paranoia, I've ordered her to be discrete."  
"Ensign Relleu..." Kira repeated, not understanding.  
Bashir beamed. "She's a Horta."  
Now understanding was all too clear. Kira took off towards the care-camp at a dead run.

It was a rock. And it moved. The other children, including Jes, crowded around in open fascination. Touching and poking. Odo fended them off with, "Would *you* like to be poked?"  
Word had got around about his laboratory origins. A fascinated, yet respectful circle formed.  
"That wasn't necessary," said the rock, via a complicated-looking box attached to its front half. "Curiosity is natural. My people don't get around a lot."  
Odo turned to face the creature, trying to conceal the pang of jealousy. "Your... people."  
"I'm a Horta," said the female voice supplied by the box. "A silicon based life form. Most of us are miners, but I wanted to see the stars."  
_I want to just go home,_ he thought. _If I still have one._ He kept looking at the box. "That can't just be a translator. It's too big."  
"Well spotted. There's a few things in there I find useful. Including lunch. I wanted to eat under a tree. Do you know a good one?"  
The others, once it was clear that the moving rock would not be doing anything more interesting than having a picnic, moved on to other things. Odo, self-appointed guide, lead the Horta to a shady spot.  
"Please. Sit."  
He thought he saw a trap. "Why would a Starfleet Ensign want to sit with an orphan child?"  
An electronic sigh. "...tried to tell him it wouldn't work..." the female voice muttered. "We know you're silicon, too, Odo."  
Prevarication. "I'm not Odo... My name is Jes."  
"I can 'see' you're not like the others, Odo. I don't need a tricorder to tell me that you are not a carbon-based life-form."  
"Then what do you want?" He was halfway ready to bolt.  
"I'd like to offer you some food. See if you like it? You must be starving, by now."  
"I've... been getting by," he allowed.  
The box opened and tractor beams laid out a spread. "The red cubes are a popular Horta candy. They... pop. So don't be alarmed."  
It looked and felt like a clear red crystal. The surface 'tasted' harmless, according to a molecular-small sample via his fingers. He mimicked the humanoid way of eating, so as not to disturb the few watching from a distance, and kept the Horta candy in his head. So he could eject it if it proved--  
{plup!}  
There was three times the expected volume of a strange new liquid. Odo instinctively formed a defensive shell around it in milliseconds. Then cautiously investigated the contents.  
Interesting. Very interesting. It was gone, becoming part of him, before he could think about it.  
"I expected gas," he murmured, picking up another for further testing. Ah, chemistry... The solid used a molecular key to unlock a rapid reaction that *made* the liquid... and made it delicious.  
"Try the blue prism," prompted the Horta. "It's something of a staple."  
Emboldened, he picked it up. More than a handful. It would be... tricky... to emulate eating it. Odo let his hands dissolve the outer layer. Tasting it.  
"My name's K'K'rsh'v Relleu," she said. "My friends call me Kiki."  
"I can see why." The molecular structure was friable in convenient directions. Convenient enough to make him seem like he was eating. He took a 'bite' and enjoyed the larger sample.  
The next thing he knew, he was leaning against Kiki and staring at the clouds and making little, "ah, ah" noises.  
"You *must* have been starving," said Kiki.  
"I didn't... do anything *odd*, did I?"  
"Just ate all the blue prisms and sat back sighing. I think that might be enough for today, hm? You don't want to get sick."  
"From eating?"  
"It happens. Even to silicate species... and here comes trouble."  
Major Kira was leaping the fence, a look of urgency on her face.  
Odo stood. "I'll hold her off. You make a break for it." He held his hands up. Somewhere between the 'stop' and 'don't shoot' gestures. It had worked before to stop Mora. "Major?" he called. "There's no need for alarm. The Ensign was just being friendly."  
Kira slowed. Sized the both of them up. Checked her phaser.  
_Uh oh._  
"Tell me what you know about the weapon in the research centre."  
Fighting or escaping meant... collateral damage. So many innocents around. He put his hands on his head and knelt in the dirt. "I'll come quietly," he murmured. "Just... don't cause a panic because of me. Please."  
"Put your hands down, I won't shoot," said Kira.  
He looked up. Read her face and posture. Then slowly lowered his hands. Not a twitch.  
"Are *you* the weapon?"  
A long sigh, in which he mentally bade farewell to food, the sky, and the few friends he'd made today. "They tried to make me into one. Repeatedly. They kept ignoring a vital flaw."  
"Yes?"  
"I can't kill. I don't even want to hurt... they couldn't make me." He looked down. "Not that it ever stopped them trying." Odo closed his eyes. They would take him away now. He would not fight. But that didn't mean he had to co-operate. He increased his internal density, making himself as heavy as possible.  
Then someone shot him with a phaser. Heavy stun.  
Ow.

It always hurt when he could move again. Primary among his hurts was moving exhausted matter Aside in exchange for the stuff that was marginally more rested. Moving any large volume of his mass Aside hurt.  
Odo voiced a groan, made himself move.  
White room. Observation mirror. Shelves.  
Joy. Another lab.  
Odo slumped back into the pallet and stayed there. If he just held his shape and stayed still, he could squeeze extra time out of this form. Maybe Starfleet would get bored and go away.  
"You are being assessed," said a voice over the comms. "Please rise and complete the tests." The voice was annoyingly emotionless. Male, but emotionless.  
"Flakk off," Odo growled. "I've been tested enough."  
"You will be rewarded upon completion of the tests."  
"But not with my freedom."  
"That will take time."  
Odo scoffed. "Too much time. Go away."  
Silence. He could barely hear a muffled conversation on the other side of the wall. An argument. Sooner or later, they would think of punishing him for disobedience. Thanks to Mora and his superiors, Odo had a high pain threshhold. They could torture him for days, and he wouldn't crack.  
"How much time is too much time?" asked the bland male.  
"Any time in a lab is too much time."  
"The sooner you complete the test objectives, the sooner you will be allowed autonomy."  
"Prove it," Odo challenged.  
Another muffled argument behind the wall, then someone beamed in. He was yellow. Literally. He knelt in Odo's eyeline, pulled up his sleeve, and opened a panel in his arm.  
He was technology.  
"I was also found," he said. Same emotionless voice. "I was also... tested. It took some time, but I am now a functioning member of society." He closed up his arm again and tugged his sleeve back. "Is that sufficient proof?"  
"Maybe they found a different kind of leash for you," Odo sat up so he could nod towards the android's uniform.  
The android quirked his head. "I do not understand the metaphor..."  
"Never mind. Let's get this over with." He stood, looking at the array of things on the bench. Children's toys. Specifically... puzzles. He was halfway tempted to loose his shape and sort them in the shortest possible time. Except they'd probably shoot him again.  
Therefore, he used his hands as a humanoid would. He could do these with half his attention paid to the task. They were simple spatial recognition tasks. Even the two-dimensional one with the picture on it.

Kira stared at the creature on the other side of the glass with rather less detatchment than the Starfleet officers assigned to monitor it. She'd heard too many things about a creature in the research centre. About what it could do.  
All she could think was, _I touched it. What is it going to do to me?_  
As it solved one puzzle, Starfleet beamed it out and replaced it with another, more complicated one. Still, the creature worked through them sequentially. When it reached the end, it spared a malevolent glare for the glass before returning to the beginning.  
By the beginning of the third cycle, it just sighed.  
The fourth cycle was a brightly-coloured assembly of plastic... with a living thing inside. An Earth mouse.

Odo was starting to feel the familliar weariness of the end of his cycle. He could last a few more hours, but would not tell the scientists yet.  
He had to figure out the puzzle.  
It was one he hadn't seen before. An apparent solid shape made out of moulded plastic parts in every colour of the rainbow. With an exotic animal inside.  
Two containers materialized. Apparently identical. Inside one was an assortment of organic things similar to a small pile within the cage. Inside the other... blue pellets.  
He sampled one. Minerals and some compounds harmful to carbon-based life. Tasty for him, but nasty for them.  
They wanted to see if he'd poison or feed the animal. Time to give them something they didn't expect.

"What the--?" murmured Kira. "What's it doing?"  
The android rapidly pressed keys. "Odo has released the mouse... and appears to be eating the poison."  
"Suicide?" Kira wondered.  
"I am not reading any ill effects in the subject. Silicate life is immune to many carbon-based poisons. Perhaps he believes we are rewarding him."  
The creature deliberately laid the container of mouse food on its side, so the freed rodent could eat as it chose. Then, grip solidly on the container of poison, walked calmly up to the glass and knocked. "I'm going to need a pail and a privacy screen. Five litre capacity. As soon as you can."  
The android used the comm. "If you wish to eliminate--"  
"No. I need to *rest*." It calmly ingested another handful of poison. "Doesn't Starfleet law dictate that you must see to my basic comfort?"  
The android turned to his human superior. Who pre-empted him.  
"Very well, Mr Data. See to his comfort."  
"Both items?"  
"Just the pail. Let's see what he does."  
Kira understood the wisdom. No telling what it would do if given privacy.  
The creature snorted out a, "Typical," and picked up the pail. It faced the glass. "Ever thought that *I* might be testing *you*?" It placed the empty poison container on the sill and moved the bucket out of their immediate view. In a corner, next to the wall that held the one-way window.

Odo leaned against the wall, just out of their sight. Quickly, before they could beam in and pry. Posture straight. Arms crossed over chest so they could melt quickly into a simple column. Pail steady. And...  
...*relax*...  
The last part of him slid gratefully into his new container just as the android Starfleet officer beamed in.  
_This is part of the test, too._  
What would they do to him when he was so completely vulnerable?  
And the answer was... nothing.  
The android scanned him once, said, "Fascinating," and beamed back out again.  
Odo ignored the argument on the other side of the wall. He needed rest.

When he woke, there was a white box over his pail. There was also the cloying tacky sensation that went with one of the mild sedatives that knocked him out. Either they'd isolated him or they'd moved on to the psychological portion of the test.  
Odo extended a tendril and tested it. The plastic cover moved easily. He slid out and re-formed his humanoid child-self. His testers would want continuity. And his 'adult' shape wasn't that convincing, anyway.  
The featureless room was empty again. A bare bench greeted him under the light of the ceiling. He tapped on the mirror. "Anyone behind there?"  
Silence.  
He tested the walls out of idle curiosity. Yes, there were seams and cracks. And yes, they were guarded by force shields. And the lack of apparent doors left him sealed in here until something happened.  
Still, there *was* one thing he could do.  
He picked up the pail and, out of sight of the mirror, pushed it into his matter and then, Aside.  
One thing they couldn't take from him.  
Then one of the walls exploded.  
He ducked out of pure instinct, then assessed the damage. Clear means of escape. The observation window had been shattered. Some luckless humanoid sprawled across the console inside. Things were sparking. This was not a safe environment for any living thing.  
He was going to regret this...  
Odo got himself under the bulk of the unconscious officer and carefully hauled him out.  
There was chaos and alarms. People running. Arrows lit up, sporadically, showing the way to evacuate. He followed them, slower than the panicking throng.  
There was another trapped humanoid. Awake. Pinned by debris from the explosion. Odo put the unconscious one carefully down. On his side. He remembered unconscious humanoids couldn't be placed on their backs or their fronts. He shifted whatever rubble he could. Working down to the lower half.  
It was that puppy of a doctor from the medical tent.  
"Carefully, please," he said. "I think... I may be wounded."  
Blood darkened the flooring. "You're a doctor. Were you carrying a medkit?"  
"No, but there's one in the wall... I... I'm under the wall it was in. Look for a silver box. With Starfleet insignia in red."  
Odo found it by one of his feet. Passed it to the man, who instantly broke out the tricorder and scanned himself.  
"Oh... kay. I've got a piece of metal through my leg. Move everything carefully. Stop when you see it."  
He did as he was told. The injury looked bad. He could never stand it when humanoids... leaked.  
There was someone else down on the other side of the ruptured wall. Something gasseous and brown clung to a lower area of shielded flooring. It was spreading from a slow leak near a lot of lables cautioning how corrosive it was.  
"Hold this here," said the doctor.  
"There's someone else--"  
"He's dead. Hold this."  
The dead man moved. Groaned.  
Odo didn't think. Ran to the downed officer. Thickened his skin and shifted shape to pick him up easily. Hauled him out. Laid him carefully beside his first rescuee.  
Then, resuming his usual shape, knelt by the doctor and held the appliance where it was needed.  
"What have you *done*?" demanded the doctor.  
"Saved a life. I believe that's supposed to be *your* job."  
"You stirred it up. The air currents carry that stuff everywhere. It'll be following those air currents straight to *us*."  
Odo looked back. He could see it boiling and swirling. Drifting. And eating through things. "Then we have to evacuate."  
"We're contaminated!"  
"And Starfleet doesn't have something to deal with that?"  
"The antigen was in the lab."  
Sigh. "Tell me what to look for."  
"Near the airlock. Orange cylinder. I'll... try calling for help."  
Odo spotted it. Formed suction pads to ease across the walls above the roiling vapour. Grabbed it and eased himself just as carefully back.  
His legs felt like they were burning. They were turning black. He pushed the darkening mass into one limb. Concentrated it.  
It hurt to shapeshift it.  
At least it wasn't spreading.  
The puppy doctor seized the orange cylinder and sprayed the humanoids in the area. He turned the nozzle on to Odo. Halted.  
"What's the matter?" Odo demanded.  
"This is... poisonous to silicate life. The dosage you need to stop the contamination... it would be fatal."  
Again, he didn't think. "I'll help you three to the nearest escape bay. Then I'll go back and set this off."  
"You'll die."  
"The Bajorans have a saying. 'Better to die free'."  
"...than...?" the doctor prompted.  
"That's it," he said. Someone had abandoned a lev-trolley. Odo laid the unconscious men on it and seated the doctor nearby. It was agony to walk on the corroding leg, but he made it.  
Thank the Prophets, not too far.  
Another officer was loading the bay. "I can take that from here. You next, boy."  
Odo escaped his reaching hand. "Contaminated. Don't touch." Then he turned and marched as smartly as he could towards his doom.  
Better to die free.  
The roiling brown gas had reached the hole in the wall. Odo picked up the cannister and broke off the safety valve.  
There was a palpable shudder in the world. And the next thing he knew, he was facing a yellow grid on a black background. Holding nothing. Even the pain in his leg was gone.  
Odo felt oddly... cheated.  
"Well," said the puppy doctor, behind him. "I don't know about you, but *I* think that's a 'pass'."

Odo eyed the security men at the airlock. They ignored him. He stepped from Starfleet 'soil' to Bajoran with nary an outcry. He had nothing but the pail inside his mass, and his freedom. Not even replicator credits.  
He'd gone without food before he'd met the Horta. He could go without again.  
This wreckage of a station used to be Terok Nor. Now they called it Deep Space Nine. Everywhere was in ruins.  
He came to a halt at one likely place, at one tired worker and said, "May I help?"  
"Get lost, offworlder."  
Next along. Same exchange. None here seemed to want an extra pair of helping hands. Not even on the ruined Promenade.  
Not even the woman who took him from the research centre.  
"Go *home*, offworlder," she snarled.  
"I can't," he said. "Even if I could afford passage, I don't know where it is."  
"Then go back to your quarters. Nobody has any time for you."  
Odo absently placed wreckage into the bin. "I don't have those, either."  
"What do you want from me?"  
Odo looked at her, trying to read her face. "A job?"  
Kira sighed and filched a data padd from the wreckage. Tapped a note on it and locked it. "Take this to Chief O'Brien. He should be down in Lower Pylon Two."  
Co-incidentally, as far as possible from Kira's current location.  
Nevertheless, Odo bowed and said, "Thank you," before dashing off on his errand.

Miles O'Brien, filthy from his work of attempting to fix several sabotaged systems at once, looked from the note to the bearer.  
The note still read, _Keep him busy and away from me. Kira._  
'Him' still looked like a child with a mask-like face and peculiarly piercing blue eyes.  
"Dunno if I got many jobs for a kid," he allowed.  
"I only choose to appear this way," he said. "It's more convenient."  
"Convenient," Miles repeated.  
"People are less likely to shoot at something child-sized. If it makes you feel comfortable, I can adjust my height..."  
"You can do that?"  
"I'm... not carbon-based. I can change how I appear at will."  
Miles looked him over again. Thin. Seemingly eager to please. And any pair of hands was one more that he didn't have previously. "Awright. We've got to get the atmosphere regenerators going for the habitat ring. Know anything about Cardassian electronics?"  
"I can learn anything I don't know fairly quickly."

"Honey, I'm home! Lemme wash up, and I'll help you out."  
Keiko turned and started out with, "Oh, don't worry, you've had a long--" and then she saw Miles' guest.  
He stood uncertainly inside the threshold, next to the toolbox. A trapped expression frozen on his unfinished features. He looked like a scared rabbit, ready to bolt for some nearby hole.  
"Miles?" she called. "Who's this?"  
"Uh. Hello," the newcomer said. "My name's... Odo. Sorry to disturb you."  
"Don't let 'im get away, love!" Miles called. "I invited him over."  
"Oh. You're staying for dinner?" said Keiko.  
Odo looked back towards the door. Wavered on the spot. "Actually, the chief was a bit... vague... about that part."  
Keiko put the casserole down on the way to the bathroom. Threatening. "*Miles*..."  
She found him scrubbing copious clouds of dirt from his curls. "Keiko, sweetheart..."  
"What is this *about*, Miles?"  
"He doesn't have anywhere to go," Miles murmured, still scouring his hair. "No quarters, no family... no money to even get quarters. They won't take him on the free shuttle to Bajor and I don't think he wants to go back." Pleading eyes. "They had him in a *lab* his whole life."  
Keiko sighed. Exasperated. "*Miles*..."  
"I told 'im while we were workin' that I spent more time in Jeffries tubes than he had hot dinners. You know what he said?"  
"No...?"  
"What's a dinner?" Clean at last, Miles dressed in a fresh set of work clothes. "Direct quote. I don't think they fed him a lot. I don't think they hardly fed him at all."  
"I've heard things about a shapeshifter calling itself Odo," Keiko whispered. "None of them are nice."  
"I don't care what they say," said Miles. "He's a kid and he's lost and hungry. If I can help with that, and I don't... I don't think I could live with m'self."  
Keiko relented. "One night. And then you see what you can arrange."  
Miles saluted.  
Keiko found him crouched on the floor beside Molly, watching with interest as she explained her doll. "Odo? Is there anything you'd like for dinner?"  
"I'm... sorry, Mrs O'Brien. I never learned any names."  
"Well, come with me to the replicator and we'll see if we can find something."  
He murmured a polite farewell to Molly and her doll, which she giggled at, and trooped obediently behind Keiko. She tried desperately not to think, _I'm being trailled by a monster,_ as she bought up the silicate life-form menu. Thank goodness there were pictures.  
"There's the blue prisms," Odo nodded, rather than pointing. "Ensign Relleu said they were a staple. She let me have five... and... then she became worried I might make myself sick."  
Keiko made a mental calculation. A child so hungry and worn down that they could be ill from eating more than five o-nigiri rice balls... she dailled up something light but nutritious. A modest serving... and something that could be consumed with carbon life forms in the same room.  
It came up with something that looked like soup. According to the file, the bowl was 'edible' too. Or at least, edible to silicate life.  
Keiko set up places and called her family in. Sitting Molly close to the door and between herself and Miles.  
"Odo, try to eat slowly, eh? Don't want to shock your system," Miles cautioned. He sat down companionable and calm, easily equidistant between Molly and... the creature. Odo.  
_Miles has spent time with him,_ Keiko reminded herself. _He's a more qualified judge._  
Odo handled a spoon as if he'd never seen one before, yet mastered the concept fairly quickly. Were it not for the odd origins of his meal... he'd look like an ordinary child.  
He didn't offer much to the conversation, literally concentrating on his food. Taking in each new compound with the same caution as a poison tester in those horrible ancient tales of feudal times.  
_Of course, if I spent my life in a lab, I'd be careful about my food, too._  
"How long were you in the Bajoran Centre for Science?" she found herself asking.  
"A... little less than ten years. Why?"  
"So you're almost ten years old?"  
"I never said that. After they found me, they left me on the shelf for quite a while. Nobody knows how old I really am. I could have been drifting in space for..." he trailled off. "Sorry. I've disturbed you."  
"It's just a bit peculiar, is all," soothed Miles. "Lucky it all worked out in the end, eh?"  
"Lucky," repeated Odo, as if testing the word. "Yes."  
The conversation lurched back to work and moving and from there on to botany and the Bajoran efforts to reclaim and revitallize their ruined planet. Federation 'should be's were vastly outweighed by realities of radiation, bio-warfare, and out and out pollution. And each district was squabbling over who got their turn and in which order.  
Which lead to an interesting side-discussion about Bajoran foodstuffs and emergency means taken during the long war to oust the occupation.  
"They *ate* spiders?" Molly made a face.  
"Pulaku," supplied Odo. "Sort of like a spider, only..." he sketched a space in the air, "larger. I heard that some resistance cells used to breed them because they were immune to Cardassian standard crop limiting methods."  
"Crop limiting..." Keiko repeated, trying to work it out.  
"Poisoning the land with radiation and bio-weapons," Miles supplied. "Amongst other things." He mulled the idea over. "You know, the Bajoran districts on the waitin' list could farm those... Pulaku... to tide 'emselves over. Couldn't they?"  
"You could suggest it," said Odo. "I'd wager some would have nothing to lose by trying."

"Look, I know you don't like going to doctors, but you gotta at least try to give 'em a chance. Bashir's the one who sent Ensign Relleu over to share 'er lunch. He just wants to make sure your diet's not... youknow... gonna make trouble."  
"This is a lot different to the med tent."  
"I *promise* you'll walk out again," said the Chief.  
Kira skirted around the creature to intercept O'Brien. "Chief," she nodded. "I wanted to thank you personally for the Pulaku farming suggestion you gave to Sisko. It... It's saved a lot of lives."  
"Not my idea. I just passed it on."  
"Then congratulate your wife for me."  
"Actually, it was Odo who told me all about them. The rest was just... natural progression."  
"You?" she boggled at the creature. "Why?"  
"Do I have to have a motive?"  
"Everyone *does*..."  
"I'll have to think of one," it said. "I'll let you know when I have something suitable." It bowed formally, like any Bajoran would, and continued on its way.  
Kira Nerys decided she needed to do some independant research.

"Odo, I need you to remain *calm*," Julian repeated. "These baselines aren't going to be any good if you're stressed."  
"Then don't stand between me and the door."  
Chief Miles O'Brien leaned casually on a nearby wall. "It's all right, lad. It ain't gonna hurt."  
"I'm not very reassured by that statement."  
"The sooner I can get your baselines, the sooner I can let you go," Julian offered. "Is that incentive enough?"  
Odo sighed the long sigh of someone putting up with something they personally despised. "I'm doing my best."  
"Good. Lie down on the diagnostic bed, please."  
His hands were still flexing in and out of fists. The breathing slowed, as did the odd subspace pulse in the middle of his torso. Julian concentrated on getting the readings as quickly as he could.  
"Aaannnnd.... done. Excellent. You can go."  
Odo sat up. "That's... it?"  
"Well, yes. I'd like to monitor any progress each week, but I have everything I need for now."  
"Thirty seconds," Odo whispered. "He had me locked in there for ten *years*..."  
"I'll send you a list of compounds, later. Recommended and best avoided," said Julian. "Clearly labled."  
Odo nearly stumbled into the doorframe, looking back to say a stunned, "Thank you."  
O'Brien patted him on the shoulder. "There, that wasn't so bad, eh? On to work."  
Julian smiled to himself. Now, to check the scans against known silicate life-forms in all accessable databases. Cross-reference with recommended dietary intake.  
If he was good at keeping things brief and genial, he might just help Odo over the severe belonophobia he'd acquired at the research centre. Thus, he was surprised when the computer found a match on Bajor.  
He found an *exact* match.  
_Huh. The files from the old research centre._ He downloaded them into a datapadd, for a little idle study the next time he had nothing to do.

End of shift. Odo watched and tried a few tentative farewells to the Chief's workmates. Few responded.  
The twists and turns they took together lead away from his quarters. "Where are we going?"  
"Dax's place. She said she'd look after you tonight."  
Odo tried to infer. "So... your wife doesn't want me back?"  
"It's not that. I promised her one night. You gotta keep your promises."  
"Why?"  
"So people will know you're trustworthy."  
"Trust...worthy," Odo tasted the word. "Yes, I can see how that would work."  
O'Brien pressed the door chime and grinned. "Don't worry. Dax says she loves kids."  
Dax had a wide smile and an exotic air lent by the pattern of spots. "Miles," she cooed. "You didn't tell me he was *adorable*!" She knelt and dazzled him with congeniality. "Has he been making you work all day? *I'd* say you're overdue for some *play*."  
"But-- I--"  
Dax already had his hand. Almost dragged him into her quarters.  
O'Brien laughed, "Have fun. See ya tomorrow." And then he was gone.  
"There's a bit of time before dinner. I have some games we could play, I figured you might be a bit more familliar with Bajoran ones, so I got T'kalep, Rhynso, Balikam..." during her speech, she let go of his hand.  
Odo used the opportunity to escape as far as possible from her. Though modesty prevented him from venturing into the bedroom or bathroom, he did fetch up between her couch and a small set of shelves containing even smaller objects of art.  
There, he crouched and tried not to panic-freeze.  
Dax trailled off, noticing his flight. "What's the matter? Am I scaring you?"  
Odo couldn't think of lying. He'd been caught out before. He obviously didn't have the knack. "...yes?"  
Again, she lowered herself to his level. This time, she kept her distance. "I just want to play. Haven't you ever played?"  
"...no..."  
The smile lost its impetus. "I'm sorry," she soothed. "I didn't mean to come on so strong. Come on out of there, hm? I'll show you how some of these work."  
"Sorry," he managed. "People who... manipulated me like that... never had good intentions."  
"Well I *promise*, I have *only* good intentions. Trust me. I'm a grandmother."  
This lit his own curiosity. "You look very young."  
"Parts of me are older than I look." She explained, along with the games, about Trill nature and hosts and symbiotes.  
Odo didn't volunteer much about his own history. None of it seemed... share-worthy.  
But bit by bit, he learned to be comfortable with her native exhuberance. She acclimated him to casual touch, and to fun. He laughed without forcing the sound. Relaxed.  
They ate together - separate dishes, of course - while seated on the floor and watching a holo of some ancient comedy. Dax answered his questions easily, and had an endless patience for his 'why's.  
He almost didn't notice that his cycle was at an end.  
Dax panicked when he grunted and curled in on himself. "Are you all right? Should I page Doctor Bashir? Chief O'Brien?"  
"No. No. It's... normal. I'm just... tired. I didn't notice."  
"Oh, right. You need a private spot and... your... container. Um. You didn't have luggage..."  
Odo used her half-panicked casting about for a substitute to extract, unnoticed, his own pail from his mass. "It's all right. I bought it with me."  
"...where?"  
"I'm a shapeshifter, remember? I don't need luggage."  
"Oh... kay," she only raised her eyebrows. "Do you need help?"  
"Just privacy. Thank you."  
She ushered him into her budoir nonetheless, and set up a screen and then, of all things, insisted on kissing him goodnight.  
The contact wasn't unwanted. He was just... not used to it.  
Odo decided not to tell her that.

It became something of a pattern. Work all day in O'Brien's shadow, sometimes doing several maintenance chores on his own, including a break for lunch and some conversation. Then, dinner and distraction at some other officer's place 'for just one night'.  
He met most of the Starfleet staff that way. Their individual ideosyncracies were positively *fascinating*. He learned more in the space of a month about humanoids and various cultures than he had in years.  
Even the few tolerant Bajorans he met supplied more than Mora ever had.  
Emboldened, he attempted to apply for Bajoran citizenship.  
His first five applications were rejected before they could be sent to Bajor, after being held for analysis for the longest legitimate time. Each time, he tried to analyse what he'd done wrong and do it right the next time. Only to fail again.  
O'Brien caught him filling in forms, one lunch-break. "What's that? Homework?"  
"Application for Bajoran citizenship," said Odo. "I think the real problem's been the dialect I've been using. It's... rather obscure and doesn't translate well." The few who did speak the Lab creole were generally psychotic wrecks, because they were survivors of Cardassian experiments. Even if he was at his most eloquent, there was a stigma. This time, he was working in High Bajoran, which was... difficult. He'd learned it because everyone on Bajor learned it, but hadn't found cause to apply it very often. He'd had to refresh his memory on more than a few phrases, much to his embaressment.  
O'Brien peered over his shoulder. "Isn't that a bit like filling in your forms in Ancient Latin?"  
"High Bajoran is a lingua franca for a reason, chief. Everyone learns it. It's been mangled a little by common use, but the formal phraseology can be understood by everyone."  
"You want me to sponsor you?"  
"No offense, chief, but it would... look better if I had Bajoran support. I've... heard there are some in the process who... object to Starfleet 'butting in'."  
O'Brien nodded. "Right. I'll talk to some folks who put you up for the night. They might want to help."  
"Thankyou," he said.

Garak looked up from his sketches to the potential customer. He was a stalker. One of the quiet ones who looked at everything and touched little. A groat-counter who would examine everything and finally purchase something off the sale rack.  
"Looking for something in particular?"  
He retreated from the coat as if burned buy it. "You... have... and interesting aesthetic. Almost... galactic. For a Cardassian."  
And weren't the mannerisms that went with that speech so very, *very* Bajoran? "What can I say? Other cultures fascinate me. Why don't you tell me about yours?"  
"I... I don't have one. That I know of."  
Everything clicked. "You're that silicate boy. Odo, isn't it?"  
Sigh. "Yes."  
"I hear tell you've been trying to become officially Bajoran."  
"Really?" he padded closer. "Have you heard tell of anything else?"  
Garak smiled. "Not so fast. There's a human phrase... quid pro quo?"  
"So. What can I do for you?"  
"I hear dear doctor Julian is throwing a party for--"  
"FORGET IT, *CARDASSIAN*!" Such *fury*.... He stormed for the door as if looking for something to bite.  
"Wait. Please! I just want some *advice*..."  
Growled. "This had better not be some Cardassian attempt at humour."  
"No, it's a birthday party for Moryn Adar, the security chief? I need some advice for what to get him as a gift."  
"Advice on a gift? That's it?"  
"The man is mind-bogglingly close-mouthed. And irritable to boot."  
"No surprise. Part Cardassian *and* his name literally means 'lost and found'..."  
"Really?"  
"It's fairly common for foundlings to gain the name 'Adar' or variants of it... but the family name Moryn? There's a story behind *that*."  
Garak smiled. "Just focus on the gift, hm? See what you can find out."

Moryn looked over the datapadd at the apparent child in his office. Flat, smooth features. Brownish ensemble in the Bajoran style, yet quasi-military and almost tellingly bland.  
"Do you need assistance?" he enquired.  
"Maintenance," said the boy. He handed over a datapadd with the orders. "I was sent to inspect the environmental controls in all the officer's quarters. And... you list your place of residence as... *here*."  
"I keep a bunk in the back office. Knock yourself out."  
"I prefer not to," said the boy. He took back his datapadd and journeyed into the back.  
Moryn followed him into the very spartain space that sufficed for his basic needs. Made sure he didn't try to pry.  
"Not very personalized, is it?" said Odo.  
"Get on with your job," grated Moryn.  
"Sorry. Most humanoids prefer a little... patter. I've got into the habit of it. Why *do* you prefer this... environmental anonymity?"  
"That's none of your business."  
"It... sort of is," said Odo as he plugged in a diagnostic tool to the environmental control panel. "In order to assimilate, I've... had to study humanoid habits. There's an almost universal desire to... leave some kind of territorial mark. The colour of the furnishings, pillows, pets... Even art. This? It's a prison cell with a wardrobe."  
"Are you *done* yet?"  
Odo nodded, putting things back into their place. "Why *don't* you personalize your space?"  
"Out. And tell the birthday party conspiracy that you couldn't get anything out of me."  
"What?"  
"I don't celebrate my age, I don't need clutter and I *don't* want a *party*. Out!" He chased the boy away and resumed finishing his forms.

"Odo!" O'Brien waved him over. "Come on, we were all just having a chat."  
The chief was 'co-incidentally' with Bashir, Dax, Kira, Sisko and Garak in the Replimat.  
"Ah," said Odo. "This must be the 'birthday party conspiracy'. I wondered why it was so easy to get those orders, Chief..."  
O'Brien had the decency to blush. "Well..."  
"We were *all* wondering what Security Chief Moryn might... appreciate," said Sisko.  
"He appreciates being left alone to do his *job*," said Odo.  
Major Kira laughed. "Didn't I tell you? He's an ill-tempered, overbearing, cross-patch and he *likes* it that way. He probably won't even come if you *did* throw it, Julian."  
Bashir looked downcast *and* crestfallen. "I just... wanted to do something for him..."  
Odo shook his head and positively stormed towards the security office. The door wouldn't open dramatically and he had to sidle through in order to satiate a desire for urgency.  
"What's *wrong* with you?" Odo demanded.  
"I don't need the fuss. I don't need another forced social engagement."  
"Don't you *understand*? They *want* you. They *want* to enjoy your company. They *want* to spend their free time... *their* time... with *you*. I've had to fight for a month for even the barest scrap of such recognition and you're--" he grasped for the right phrase, "throwing it in the recycler. *WHY*?"  
Chief Moryn stared at him, slowly putting his datapadd down. "You're that shapeshifter, aren't you?"  
"That's *not* the point. How can you just sit there and choose to throw away something like that?"  
Moryn spent a long time staring at him. "Everything I enjoy gets taken away. Or destroyed. I learned not to want *anything*."  
Odo nodded at that. "What you don't have, they can't take away? I learned a bit of that, too." He sighed. "They want to let you know they accept you. Can't you at least pretend to tolerate it?"  
He sighed and leaned back in his chair. "I suppose it's plausible. I'll think about it."  
Odo bowed and made to leave.  
"And Odo?"  
He paused, looked back. "Yes?"  
"Tell them... these chambers could use a little... colour."  
Odo left with a far lighter step, and found Chief O'Brien waiting for him.  
"I heard some o' that," he said.  
"You were listening in?"  
"Well... th' yelling was hard to miss."  
Odo winced. "I... didn't mean to cast aspersions on your hospitality."  
"Oh, I know *that*." The engineer patted Odo's shoulder and hoisted his kit. "Keiko asked about you, this mornin'. She'd like to invite you over."

Odo found Moryn lurking in a corner at his own party and seated himself in the window. "Incredible, isn't it?" he said. "All these people like you."  
"I thought you were staying over at Anara's tonight."  
"I wanted to stop by and give you this." Odo offered a small cuboid box, tied with a festive ribbon. "Happy Acceptance."  
Moryn shook his head, but said, "Thank you," and pried it open. Extracted the object inside. "It's... a rock..."  
It was a rock with google-eyes glued on and a puff of genuine fake fur in a lurid shade of blue, also glued to the top.  
"It's a pet rock," said Odo. "Duranium ore. Practically indestructable."  
Moryn started at the shapeshifter and his enigmatic little half-smile. "You wasted your replicator rations on this?"  
"Technically... yes. But I don't consider it a waste." The shapeshifter stood, patted Moryn on the arm. "Try to enjoy the party, hm? Sociallize. It's what you humanoids *do*."  
Moryn stared at the rock. The rock stared back.  
"Don't look at me in that tone of voice," he murmured.

"So tell me about this 'technicality' that allowed you to replicate that little toy you gave me last night."  
Odo looked up from his work. "Am I in trouble?"  
"No, I just like to find out about things," said Security Chief Moryn.  
"Well, technically, I didn't replicate it. Chief O'Brien did."  
"Really."  
"He's been holding my wages in a sort of trust, for me. Until I can get citizenship and an account of my own."  
"Oh?"  
"It's a legal technicality I find increasingly annoying," Odo confessed. "I'm not recognized by any government body as *alive*, let alone sentient, so... I can't be assigned quarters, paid wages, hold an account, conduct business transactions... and so on."  
"You could apply for citizenship somewhere else," offered Moran.  
"I looked that up, too. The type of place that would just accept me as a citizen without inquiry are also the places that would get me automatically deported from this station." Odo finished his work and closed the access panel. "Is there a point to this?"  
"Just trying to see how it all fits together. How many applications have you written?"  
"I'm working on my twentieth."  
"And the turnaround time, between submission and rejection?"  
"Four business days. I work on new ones over the weekend. Submit on Monday, rejected by Friday, working up the next submission on Saturday to repeat the cycle."  
"And you're never given a reason for the rejection."  
"No. It's just sent back as insufficient." Odo started his journey to his next assignment. "No signiature, no date stamp, just... insufficient."  
"I suspect another legal technicality," said Moryn. "I'll investigate further."

Kira hailed O'Brien with a friendly wave as he turned from the replicators. "Chief! I need to talk to you about something."  
His perpetual shadow, the creature known as Odo, took one look and said, "I'll go sit over there," indicating a table outside Kira's personal discomfort zone.  
Good. The further it was away from her, the better.  
"I've been getting a lot of complaints about the replicators in Habitat Three," she began.  
Moryn, patrolling the Promenade, came to a halt at the replimat. "Odo'ital drik'Zok, 1802041110-D," he announced. "I have an outstanding warrant for your recovery as missing or mis-appropriated property originally belonging to a Doctor Mora Pol, of the Bajoran Institute of Investigative Research. You are to proceed with me to a holding area until your distinguishing marks can be verified."  
In one, quick movement, Odo had the Constable's phaser and a trembling aim on the security team. He backed into a corner. Civillians swarmed out, aided by the security detail.  
"You can't put me back there! He tortured me!"  
Kira had her own phaser out without thinking. So did half the security crew.  
"What's this about?" said O'Brien. "Odo isn't property..."  
"The law says he is, Chief," said Moryn. "He isn't a citizen of anywhere, and the only documentation he has is that of a scientific research animal, licensed to Doctor Mora Pol. I don't like it, but sometimes, I have to follow the law."  
"Odo... put the gun down," the Chief was edging closer. "We can talk about this.... Just try to be reasonable."  
A panicked babble, "Irequestandrequirethesanctuaryoftheunitedfederationofplanets... under... under... under threat to my freedom and... very likely my life."  
Damn. The federation would just complicate things.  
"You didn't hear that, Constable," said Kira.  
"I did," said O'Brien.  
"*I* did," said Bashir, out on the edge of the crowd.  
"I did," said Anara.  
"Traitor," hissed Kira.  
"There," said Moryn. "Three witnesses. Better than the legal minimum. If you hand the phaser back, we can talk about arrangements."  
"Stay back!" Odo ordered. "I'm not going back! You can't *do* this."  
"Unfortunately," Moryn reached into a pouch on his belt and threw a small object, "I have to." The instant it hit the floor near Odo, a white cloud billowed up, knocking Odo down like a sack of Kava beans.  
"What *was* that?" Kira wondered.  
"One of the compounds on both Bashir's forbidden list and Mora's investigated chemicals file. It causes a temporary shut-down of both cognitive and shape-shifting abilities. It'll wear off in due time." He recovered his weapon and gestured in a lev-pallet. Four security goons lifted the creature on to the pallet and herded it away.  
The witnesses had gone. Probably to Ops.  
Let them stir all the trouble they wanted. This was clearly a Bajoran matter.

Odo returned to consciousness and fully understood the human phrase, 'to be in a world of hurt'.  
Fresh liquid matter flooded into his shape, dislodging ungainly chunks of stunned-solid flesh. And the chemical itself made all his sense membranes throb.  
A howl of pain escaped him before he could quell it in a more... acceptable humanoid groan. It reverberated in the space he was in. Odo opened his eyes, squinting against the too-bright lights and the sharp, hurtful colours.  
Anonymous grey floor. Anonymous grey walls. Socket holes for shelving, but the shelving was removed. A conical pail sat in a corner. Three walls. One door. Covered by shield... in all directions. A similar room stood opposite, shelving full of things.  
He was in the confiscated item storage unit.  
Worse than a prisoner.  
He was a *thing*.  
The blind panic that thought induced made him lose his shape, but he never stopped fighting against the shields. They wouldn't let him pound the walls, nor touch them, so he struggled against the shielding like a wild thing.   
Had to get out.  
Had to get *OUT*!

"Constable! What the hell is that noise?" Sisko bellowed above the din.  
"It's the shapeshifter," Moryn pitched his voice to carry. "It objects strenuously to being impounded."  
"Then set him free! *I'll* take him into custody!"  
"I can't do that. Chain of evidence laws."  
"Then what *can* you do?"  
"Convene a trial as soon as possible... or sedate it."  
The banging and howling slowed to a halt, and diminished in volume. Moryn bought up a vid-link of the confiscated items storage unit, where Odo's mass was retreating into his pail.  
"Exhausted," said Moryn. "I doubt if it could keep such a display up for long." He rose.  
"Where are you going?"  
"Owing to it's behaviour, Odo'ital drik'Zok 1802041110-D is now classified as a dangerous animal. I can only place food in its cage when it's unconscious or otherwise incapacitated. For the mutual safety of the citizens of the station."  
"Odo *is* a citizen on the station."  
"Then where's his paperwork?"  
"I'm going to have to find it," said Sisko.  
Moryn Adar hid his smile behind an upraised datapadd.

Odo knew the half-breed chief of security was watching him. He deliberately flattened his surface.  
"Well, I know you're aware I'm here. I thought I'd tell you a few little somethings before you proceed with this cycle's display."  
Odo waited. He was good at waiting.  
"First, your applications for citizenship never reached Bajor. They never left this station. They were intercepted, labled insufficient, and returned from one duty console in ops."  
Moryn took a breath. Steeling himself. "Kira Nerys has been blocking your applications."  
Odo reared out of his container, fully prepared to lash out as best he was able.  
"Second..." he held up a hand in a very don't-shoot gesture like Odo's own. "It may not seem like it, but I am on your side. Work *with* me on this. Everything will go well."  
Odo finished his transformation into his childlike form. "How do I know I can trust you?"  
"I trusted you about the party. I won't lie and pretend that this isn't going to be... painful. But one way or another you will walk out of this a free citizen. I'll see to it myself, if I have to."  
"Why?"  
"Let's just say I have a soft spot for those who tend to get a bad reputation before anyone knows them." He made a go-ahead gesture. "You may resume kicking up hell."  
As if he didn't have enough of a prompt with the pile of silicate foodstuffs in a pet's bowl. Odo ate quickly, then imagined Mora on the other side of the shield... and kicked up hell.

All the shopkeeps on the Promenade had assembled. The air of low-grade fury was palpable.  
The leader was Quark. He had wads of fibre stuck in his ears.  
"We can't conduct business with that caterwauling going on! We demand you do something!"  
"I'll have to route your complaint through Ops," Moryn said. "There have been legal complications regarding the creature's status."  
Major Kira barged into the mess. "Can't you shut that thing up?"  
"Why Major... your actions are directly responsible for this noise."  
"What?"  
"Your duty station... your work schedule... your duty to pass on applications for citizenship in the diplomatic pouch..." Moryn handed across the padd full of evidence. "Your call to Doctor Mora... *Your*. Mess. I have to patrol the docking ring, now."  
The crowd of angry merchants parted for him, but not for Kira.

The shields hurt, but accepting the cage was the worst thing he could do for himself.  
"SHUT UP!"  
The angry Bajoran storming in was Kira Nerys. Odo resumed his shape, panting from the heat, face waxen. "You told me you wouldn't let this happen."  
"That was before I knew you were a *weapon*."  
"I... I was never a weapon. I don't kill."  
"Yet," the Major snarled. "Who knows who you're programmed to destroy?"  
Odo felt his hands tightening. Forced them to relax out of fists. Several times. As an anger-gesture it was both completely useless and not helping his case at all. "I spent ten years with a man who tortured me every day. If I was going to kill anyone, it would be him. And yet... not only is he alive, but he's petitioning to take me back to the torture chamber."  
"Good. Maybe he'll deprogram you."  
"De--?" Odo barked a noise of disgust. "Nothing's going to convince you, is it? You've already drawn your conclusions."  
"Why should it convince me? You're the most natural liar I've ever seen."  
"Liar? I don't--"  
"Don't even think about arguing. That shape you use is a lie. Every gesture, every inflection... it's an affectation. Something you use to get what you want. Whatever that is."  
"Would you even try communicating with me in my native state? Would you know *how*?"  
"Why would I want to bother. You're an offworlder."  
In spite of himself, Odo laughed. He laughed harder at Kira's drawn phaser and bark of, "What's so flakking funny?"  
Odo controlled himself. Barely. "And I thought *I* had a bad case of Hommstok Syndrome... You're almost as bad as the Cardassians."  
She fired. The phaser beam splashed against the shields. Harmonics rippled around him and jangled against his senses.  
"Don't say that! Don't you *dare* say that!"  
A brief klaxxon sounded, followed by the approach of a pair of security goons.  
"Stand down, Major. You know it's illegal to fire on a captive."  
"He's deliberately antagonising me," said Kira, her phaser still drawn. "He called me a Cardassian."  
"I was monitoring the exchange, Major," said the spokesgoon. "He did not do that."  
"Holster your weapon or we'll have to hold you for violation of Bajoran law," said the other one.  
Kira threw her phaser at them. The spokesgoon caught it one-handed. She paced right up to the shields. He could hear tiny arcs ticking against her facial down.  
"I am *nothing*. Like *them*."  
"Then we've *both* learned more from our captors than we're comfortable with."  
She moved smoothly into a fighting stance, almost poised to strike... and stopped herself. "No," she said. "I'm going to let the Bajoran courts put you away."  
Odo couldn't let her have the last word. "You told me you wouldn't let that happen! Were you lying to me then? Or was it just a Spoonie-oath?"  
The look of pure venom she shot back at him... hurt.  
Once, he thought he owed her everything. Just for taking him out of the place that had been his centre of pain. Was that a Spoonie-oath, too? Or was he, just now, lashing out in pain at the most convenient target?  
_Maybe I am a weapon,_ he mused. _I certainly cause enough damage._  
He couldn't stand his shape, any more, and poured himself into the container.

Miles looked down at the pail of orange liquid. "Security Chief Moryn says you've been like this for twenty-six hours," he said. "I'm worried about you. I wanted to get Bashir in here to verify you're all right, but..." he sighed. Scrubbed at his hair. "Did the Major hurt you?"  
Odo stirred, extended a column upright. Formed just enough shape to speak. "We managed to hurt each other, Chief... with the things we had to say."  
"That why you're not... getting back to your humanoid form?"  
"The Bajoran poet said it best. _This above all, to thine own self be true_,"  
"_And it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man_," Miles finished.  
"You've heard of him?"  
"Everyone lays a claim to Shakespeare," Miles smiled. "Earth's the only one with original manuscripts, though."  
"Don't tell that to the Cardassians."  
He laughed, in spite of the funerial mood of their settings, and sat companionably beside him. Or as close as companionably as he could get, what with the poor lad stuck in a lock-up locker.  
"How're you holding up?"  
"I hate cages. I hate the waiting. I hate the indignity."  
"So... not very well, then."  
"No."  
"Sisko's got Dax workin' as your legal representative. She can out-think Vulcans when she puts her mind to it. Come to think of it, the both of them are playing their cards close to their chests."  
"...cards? What do cards have to do with anything?"  
Miles had to look to remind himself. Odo didn't know Terran culture. He'd barely been exposed to Bajoran ways. And he'd probably suffered an overdose of Cardassia, just like every other Bajoran. "It's an Earth phrase. It means they're not letting anyone know what they're up to."  
"Including the people on their side."  
Miles nodded. "You don't look fifty."  
"You found my records."  
"Just a little digging of my own. You spent forty years in *storage*. How'd you manage?"  
"I didn't know any different, then. There was no concept of time, or expectation. It was... peaceful."  
"Peaceful."  
"Comparitively."  
Miles tried to contemplate the sort of life that would have one wishing to be back on a shelf in some storage facility. "Bloody hell..."  
Odo flowed into his everyday shape. Leaned against the forcefield. "Chief..."  
"Yeah?"  
"Could you see if you can find any surviving members of the expedition crew that found me?"  
"I can try. Why?"  
Odo smiled. "I might have a few close-card strategies of my own."  
Miles touched his hand against the shield, where Odo's own hand lay. Touch without touching. "That's the ticket," he grinned. "Keep up the good fight."

The most annoying thing, Odo decided, was the absence of news. He could spend days without hearing a word. Any intrusion into the storage locker bought his instant interest. Even when it was just a member of the security staff bringing in some evidence.  
He learned quickly that, if they weren't there to talk to him, they weren't going to.  
It was supremely annoying.  
One of the items he could see from his holding area was a small mandala. It was on its side and the bottom was broken open, but the symbol of faith almost called to him.  
_When you have nothing to gamble... you have nothing to lose._ He got as close to facing the mandala as he could, knelt, and put his hands up in prayer.  
_If you're out there. Here I am. Help?_  
A shadow fell on him.  
Odo looked up. The intruder was Starfleet. Humanoid. Apparently male. Yellow skin and eyes to match. The android from the tests.  
Odo put his hands down and stared at the yellow man. The yellow man stared back.  
"Well?" he said.  
"I did not mean to intrude," said the yellow man. "I am Lieutenant-commander Data. I have been assigned as your legal representative." His head quirked. "Were you engaged in... prayer?"  
Odo sighed. He knew Starfleet attitudes towards 'superstition'. "It... gives a feeling of accomplishment when there's nothing one can accomplish."  
"And you feel that there is nothing you can accomplish."  
"How much could you accomplish while locked in a storage bay like this one?"  
Tilt. Twitch. He moved like a bird, sometimes. "I concede the point." He made some notes on a datapadd. "Do you wish to assist in your own defence?"  
"As much as I can. I'm... not as up to date as I'd like to be on the nuances of Bajoran law."  
"You could just as easily petition to become a free citizen of the united federation of planets," offered Data. "Is becoming a Bajoran citizen important to you?"  
"*Yes*."  
"Why is it important?"

"Chief!" Julian leaped up into Ops before the turbolift came to a complete halt. "I just got *this* from Garak!"  
"It's an isolinear rod."  
"It's evidence! To help Odo."  
O'Brien rolled his eyes.  
"I came up here because Ops has the holographic player. What I could decipher of the data leads me to believe it's holographic in nature."  
Dax smirked. "Over here, Julian." She readied the display.  
Julian was all too eager to run to her side. He watched her hands dance with a wistful smile on his face.  
"You were right, this is a holographic recording. It looks like... a home movie?"  
Tiny figures shifted and moved above the table in the centre of Ops. Someone was running through a showman's patter and there, as the imager moved above some shoulders, was Odo.  
Shorter, less defined, and somehow more *alien*.  
"Odo! Be a Razorcat!" One of the Cardassians called.  
The holographic Odo moved as if he were about to turn a somersault... and stretched into the shape of a wild Razorcat. There was even an accurate growl.  
"Tanavian Jewel-bird!"  
Other guests laughed. Some applauded.  
"Terran Lion!"  
The bird landed in the arms of a wealthy Cardassian lady, and transformed into Odo. "Take me home?"  
They laughed at that, too.  
O'Brien had his hand over his mouth.  
The fid ended, another began. Wobbling through anonymous hallways.  
"Come on," said the edge of a Cardassian youth. "This way."  
They hacked a door.  
Beyond, a shapeshifter was running through shapes and motions detailed on a holographic display.  
"Hey freak!"  
"Do you stretch, freak?" The imager clunked onto a table and two Cardassians seized Odo's arms and legs, and pulled.  
They swung him back and forth to an ancient Cardassian nursery rhyme.  
Odo howled in much the same way as he had during his first days in the evidence locker. The howling went on, immersed in Cardassian laughter, until an alert finally sounded. It mercifully made the Cardassian youths run, scooping up the imager as they went.  
A flat image. Security footage. A stretched and distorted Odo slowly reeling his mass into a central area.  
A Bajoran entered the pickup, knelt and began helping to gather the stretched ropes of shapeshifter flesh.  
"Go on. Go rest."  
Odo's voice. Far grittier, as if speaking through water. "They... didn't like me. Why?"  
"*Rest*," insisted the Bajoran. "I'll see you tomorrow."  
The images came to a halt.  
Julian wiped moisture from his face. Everyone was stunned. Even Kira had a slightly horrified expression.  
She shook out of it first. "As if you can trust anything from a *Cardassian*."

The gavel rang against the plate. "This court is called to order," said the lead judge. "Each plaintiff shall state their case. Begin with the first claimant."  
He looked like a pleasant, middle-aged Bajoran. His smile was genial and his manner self-assured. "Doctor Mora, your honour, I have been working on this particular scientific curiosity for ten years, until the recent destruction of the former Bajoran Centre for Science. I have set up my new lab in the Bajoran Institute of Investigative Research, in the hopes of recovering it and resuming my work." He sat with a smug grin on his face.  
Data stood. "Lieutenant-commander Data. This alleged 'scientific curiosity' is a sentient life form and has formally requested assylum with the federation of planets."  
The judge made a face. "Obviously, this is not going to be an easy case. Let's hear from this... creature. Bring it in."  
He came in on a shielded lev pallet, arms folded, glaring at anyone who stared at him.  
"He looks like a child," murmured a court officer.  
"That 'child' is fifty years old," said Mora. "At the very least."  
The gavel rang again. "I will hear from the creature."  
"Odo," said Odo. "I claim my rights as an independant sentient life form... to live as *I* choose."  
"And your claim of sanctuary?"  
"Something to stop him," an impolite head-jerk in Mora's general direction, "from immediately carting me away as property."  
"If you'd just come back--"  
"I'm never going back!"  
The gavel rang again. "This is not going to turn into a free-for-all. Odo, since your status is currently under debate, you can only assist your assigned legal aide."  
"Will I be at least allowed out of this cage?"  
"So long as you don't pose a flight risk."  
"Where could I go?"  
The judge nodded. "Security Chief Moryn... release the shapeshifter."  
Only those who were listening for it could hear Odo's sigh of relief as the shields flickered out of existence.  
"All right," the judge settled herself. "We'll start with the first plaintiff. Mora Pol. State your case."  
Mora stood. "I've worked on Odo for ten years, helping him learn how to sociallize, how to use his shapeshifting gift. I taught him everything he knows... just as *I* know that he's completely unprepared for life on his own. He needs to do more work to make certain he's ready."  
Odo was murmuring into the android's ear.  
"If it wasn't for me, he would still be on a shelf, somewhere."

"You answer to the name of Odo, correct?"  
"Yes," said Odo.  
"And that name is derived from the Cardassian item category entry, Odo'ital drik'Zok 1802041110-D?"  
Sigh. "Yes."  
"Is that your original appearance in the Bajoran archives?" said Mora.  
"No."  
An indulgant smile from Mora. "No. Your first entry is as Odo'ital drik'Zok 1802041110-D."  
"My first entry is 'Kilara Dinh'.... same serial number," said Odo. "As recorded by a Bajoran expedition into the Denorios Belt. It was subsequently mistranslated as Odo'ital drik'Zok."  
"Yet you chose to use the name Odo..."  
"Continuity is very important to you humanoids. By the time I knew what my name meant... it was already too late."  
"Define 'too late'."  
"People were already talking about me by that name first, then they would broach the subject of my status as an experiment. I... tried another name, but it just got dismissed."  
"I don't recall... explain."  
"You were away at a conferance. I attempted to go by Kilara Dinh... but I was still introduced as Odo Ital, followed by, 'he says he wants to be named in Bajoran'."  
"And... how long did you attempt this change?"  
"The entirety of the two weeks you were gone. I... knew you wouldn't tolerate the change unless it was well established. I tried. I failed. The name 'Odo' stuck."  
"And why do you think I'd have... objected to the name change?"  
"You wouldn't have objected. You'd have condescendingly informed me that my attempts were counter-productive, then you'd lecture me on how no being ever chooses their name... and doubtless attempted to convince me that I was somehow better off being literally 'nothing'."  
Mora made some notes. "I... have no further questions at this time, though I reserve the right to question the subject again, as evidence demands."  
Judge Kysha made a move-along gesture with her hand.  
Data stood. "What does Odo'ital drik'Zok mean?"  
"It's Cardassian for 'nothing of importance'."  
"Why did the scientists name you Odo Ital?"  
"It was all that would fit on my original container, a Krokan petri beaker. It became... something of a laboratory joke, after they realized I was alive."  
"Your name is a joke?"  
"It... started out as such. That's why I insisted on shortening it."  
"You did not change your name upon your recovery from the ruins of the research centre?"  
"I... reasoned there was a chance a survivor would know me. Dissembling... is counter-productive. As I said, the name stuck. I knew I couldn't avoid it, so... to use a human phrase, I made the best of a bad thing."  
"Do you understand why Doctor Mora laid claim to you as property?"  
"Yes. He wouldn't have been able to drag me back as a sentient life form."

"During my time with Odo, I have catalogued five thousand, three hundred and twenty-seven mannerisms. Ninety-six percent of those mannerisms stem from the Bajoran culture," Data testified. "The remaining mannerisms are evenly divided between universal humanoid gestures and Bajoran adaptations of introduced gestures from outside their culture."  
"And what is this meant to prove?" Judge Kysha stretched in her chair.  
"If, as Major Kira suspects, Odo's every move is calculated to play to an audience... it suggests his intended audience is Bajoran."  
"You're not helping the defence at this point in time," Kysha pointed out. Indeed, Odo was slumped in his seat, looking slightly distressed.  
"Were he intending to please a Cardassian audience, I submit that he would use Cardassian gestures. If he truly wished for Starfleet's protection, he would adopt human mannerisms. I further extrapolate that Odo has assimilated more of the Bajoran culture because he *wanted* to. This suggests--"  
"*Uhnh*... urh..."  
Kysha startled. The noise of pain had come from Odo, who was now panting and looking definitively waxy. "Is the contended subject... healthy?"  
"It'snothing, I'mfine," Odo managed. Another stifled grunt escaped him. "I just--- I'm...(uhf) I won't be able to... contribute. Shortly."  
Mora stood. "Odo's time in a humanoid shape is limited. He must rest. To that end, I request a rest-break for two to three hours."  
"If Doctor Mora honestly believes his claim that Odo is property," said Data. "It should not matter which state Odo is in."  
"And if he believes the claim that Odo is sentient," Mora countered, "he should be the one pushing for a recess. For the comfort and dignity of his client."  
"Like *you* ever thought about my comfort or dignity," Odo rasped. His next attack nearly doubled him over.  
"The point is moot," Kysha rapped the gavel several times. "I can't have a distraction like this in my court. We will adjourn until such time as the contested subject is able to contribute again. Bailif? Make sure the contested subject is secured."

The court officer manipulated Odo by his shoulder until he was out of Quark's. Then it was Moryn's turn. The half-breed preferred a gentler means of shepherding him.  
Never had the distance between Quark's and the security offices seemed so large.  
Odo walked as fast as he could, bought up short when his shape pained him.  
"Try a more measured pace," suggested Moryn. "Don't strain yourself."  
"I won't--" spasm "make it if I--" spasm "measure my pace."  
The world spun, and he was looking down on it from over Moryn's shoulder. Strong hands gently gripped him... like O'Brien carried Molly.  
"There now, kitling," Moryn whispered, patting Odo's back, even as he walked. "I'll get you there."  
_Kitling?_ Odo found himself gripping the man's uniform as he spasmed. The world blurred by. And there was the locker. And his pail.  
"Don't... turn the shield on?" Odo asked.  
Moryn halted, his hand by the control. "You'll be vulnerable."  
"The shield... makes me feel like a prisoner."  
Moryn straightened. "I'll guard you." He turned around. Posed in Parade Rest.  
"Moryn?"  
"Yes?"  
"Does... Hommstok Syndrome work... both ways?"  
Moryn gave him one of his amazingly expressive micro-smiles. "Sometimes. How else could I exist?"  
Odo relaxed into his container, feeling oddly reassured. He'd been... adopted.

"You damn half-cardie cross-patch! How *could* you?" Kira Nerys barged in to the evidence lock-up, fit to chew durillium.  
"Hello to you, too," Moryn dripped sarcasm onto those words.  
"How could you side with that-- *thing*?"  
"Look at me and tell me how I couldn't," he challenged. "Remember? Bajoran-Cardassian by-blows were also considered 'experimental animals'."  
"Word's all over the station, Constable... you called him *kitling*. Are you seriously planning to *adopt* it?"  
"If nothing else works."  
"You live in the back of your office... how could you even think about this?"  
"He sleeps in a pail," Moryn shrugged. "It's not like he needs much space."  
"And you think the Bajoran provisional government is going to just let you adopt that?"  
Moryn smirked. "I know some people. They might help."  
"Well, when it strangles you in your sleep, don't come running to me."  
"Major... Have you ever thought that all those stories about weapons in the research centre... were just stories?"  
"Why would a Cardassian lie about a weapon in their possession?"  
"Why would a Bajoran lie about, say... the whereabouts of Li Nalas?"  
Kira made a face. "You can't believe it was *all* propaganda..."  
"I *can* believe that every individual deserves a chance."  
"It'll get its chance when it's *earned* one."

"What was your first impression of Odo?"  
Julian vividly remembered. "I simply thought he was another survivor of... Cardassian war crimes. We had rescued some children from the rubble, and every single one of them didn't want to have the least thing to do with doctors. Some even flew into a blind panic."  
"Did he say anything unusual?"  
"There was one thing," said Julian, "he was arguing with Major Kira, and he said something about being put away again, and then he said, 'I'll never see the sun'."  
"And what did you do?"  
"I... tried to make him feel at ease. I put my instruments down and examined him manually."  
"Did you make any assumptions from your examination? Or feel anything unusual?  
"I only assumed he was one of the few non-native children in the labs. The only thing that really stood out was that he'd been in there for three days and there wasn't a scratch on him."  
"How did you discover his silicate nature?"  
"While he was watching me, the Major opened a nearby tricorder for me and took some discrete scans. When I examined them later, the truth came out."  
"And what were your impressions then?"  
"Well, it is unusual for silicate life to resemble a humanoid, but I figured anything was possible. What I was most worried about was... his immediate well-being. That's why I sent Ensign Relleu over with some basic silicate foodstuffs."  
"Elaborate, please."  
"Well, most silicate life can survive for very long periods without... sustenance... but after cross-checking my readings against known silicate life, I could only conclude that he was... under-nourished. Hence the dietary programme."  
Security flinched, attention rivitted on Odo. Julian followed their gaze to discover that the shapeshifter had halfway leaped out of his chair, intent on Mora. He looked downright ferocious, but remembered where he was and settled down.  
He still glared burning liquid death in Mora's direction.  
Data continued as if nothing had happened. "Did you make any observations as to his culture?"  
"That's one of the things I try to look for when classifying a life-form," said Bashir. "For an alien, he struck me as... intensely Bajoran."

"I first met him about three weeks after he started working for the chief."  
"How did you meet?"  
"The replicator in our quarters was giving out distorted crockery. He turned up to repair it."  
"How did it go?" asked Mora.  
"I was a little alarmed to find an apparent child there, but... he seemed able. He located and fixed the problem in record time."  
"Could you fathom his mood?"  
"He was very pleased that he could fix it so quickly... and fascinated by my cooking."  
"Did he try any?"  
"I offered. He said... what was the phrasing? Ah. He had 'been advised not to experiment with unfamilliar substances'. I laughed. He told me it wasn't that funny, and there was a chemical in Bajoran Hasperat that he's violently allergic to."  
"Really?" Mora looked vaguely alarmed.  
"Doctor Bashir had to monitor him for twenty-six hours," said Sisko. "As I understand it, neither of them were happy about it."  
Mora shot a look to Odo, who was just glaring, and then he got back on track. "Was he angry when he corrected you? Combatative?"  
"No. Just... a little regretful."  
"Did he conceal what happened?"  
"We never got a chance to discuss it. Chief O'Brien called to remind him they were on a tight schedule. I... didn't follow it up."  
"Why not?"  
"It was none of my business."  
"So, the maintenance needed in Storage Bay Seventeen, to clean up the mess? That wasn't your concern?"  
"I was aware of it, but... Not only was it not my business, but no sentient being can help it when they have an adverse reaction to something."  
"And you didn't investigate? Pursue an inquest?"  
"All I needed to know is that it wouldn't happen again."  
"Do you ordinarily show such a callous disregard for your crew, Commander?"  
"Only when there's no harm done."  
"No harm? It could have killed him!"  
"So could any one of the experiments you conducted, Doctor."

"Are you conversant in First Contact procedures, Ensign?"  
"I... know the basics," said Relleu. "How to ascertain if a new life-form is sentient, that kind of thing."  
"And how, exactly, does Starfleet assess sentience?"  
"For an individual, or for a group, sir?"  
"For an individual."  
Odo knew exactly where this was going. He clenched his hands and tensed.  
"Primary amongst any classic signs is, of course, attempts to communicate. These come in varying methods, including imitation, mathematics, art and posture. Secondly--"  
"Let's focus on the first one. Communication. You list imitation in the signs."  
"Yes."  
"But a parrot is not, strictly speaking, sentient."  
"Parrots are classed as cusp-sentient, in that some species are capable of communicating on a simple level, but don't function as an adaptive member of society."  
"Adaptive member of society... Such an interesting phrase."  
"All sentient life adapts to circumstances surrounding it. My own species had to learn to read Standard Galactic English in order to achieve peace with the invading humans."  
"What about art?"  
"Species with visual capabilities often create images. If that species further surmises that another can *also* see and understand pictures... then uses them in an attempt to communicate. That's another avenue."  
"And if a species doesn't create art?"  
"That could mean anything. Lack of art does not necessarily imply a lack of imagination. It may simply be a lack of ability. Especially in an individual." Relleu paused. "Alternately, it could be creating a different variety of art. There's some debate about the nature of art and its efficacy in communication."  
"And what of your first contact with Odo?"  
"He'd already acclimated to Bajoran culture, so there was no understanding boundry to overcome. The translation unit worked, and communication progressed very normally."  
"I understand the other Bajoran children liked to poke at you."  
"Horta don't get out much, Doctor. Curiosity is also natural."  
"And what did Odo do?"  
"I believe he tried to save me. He tried to disengage the crowd... and then asked if they'd like to be poked." Relleu turned as if to face the judge. "That's both acts of kindness *and* empathy for the alien. Two other signs of sentience that I was unable to express earlier."  
"Loath though I am to accuse one such as you as anthropomorphising... are you certain you weren't... projecting."  
"I don't even feel a humanoid poking at me," said Relleu. "Even the most aggressive blunt-force attacks just - tickle. I was not bothered by everyone poking me. Odo *was*."  
"At this point in time, I'd like to play a small fid recording for the court," said Mora.  
The display showed Odo in earlier times, surrounded by a delegation of curious pokers. A Bajoran, Odo remembered him only as Pok, broke into the middle of it. "Hey! Back off. Would *you* like to be poked?"  
Mora froze the display. "Mimicry or gallantry, Ensign? Was he copying from a previous situation? Or was it a genuine act of kindness?"  
"I... I don't know."  
"You don't know. So you're not an expert on First Contact."  
"It takes years to train--"  
"Yes or no, Ensign."  
Sigh. "No. I'm not."  
"Therefore it may surprise you that every gesture, word, phrase or act had been learned from the sentients surrounding him, rearranging them in seemingly complicated patterns. Where, exactly, is the line between this 'cusp-sentience', and true sentience? Who among us is really equipped to judge?" He did his old, showman's gesture towards where Odo was sitting and seething. "Your honour, I give you the primate at the keypad."

"And have you noted a tendancy for... dissembling, Major?"  
"It's a shapeshifter. Everything it *does* is a lie."  
"Can you think of any... outstanding examples?"  
"You must stop this trial," said a new voice.  
Odo, who had been slumped and resigned in his chair, straightened and smiled, craning his neck to try and see the newcomer.  
The old Bajoran Vedek waved fussing attendant off as he stepped into Quark's.  
"And who are you?" said Judge Kysha.  
"I am Vedek Tabrin Dees... and I have come to speak for the child."  
O'Brien, absent for the trial so far, gave a thumb's-up gesture to Odo as he entered behind the Vedek's party.  
"Brin..." Odo whispered.  
"This 'child' is somewhere over fifty years old, Vedek."  
"We are all children of the Prophets, your honour. I have come at last to speak for this one."  
"And your basis for halting this trial?"  
"The individual now known as Odo was illegally seized by the Cardassian invasion. I contend that he was in my custody before he was captured and incarcerated. And I previously recognized him, not only as sentient life, but as a lost child."  
And then Mora asked one question too many. "How did *you* manage to do that?"  
Four words destroyed Mora's case. "I read his pagh."  
It was pandemonium. It was beautiful. Odo couldn't remember how he crossed the space between them, but he was hugging Brin for all he was worth.  
"I'm sorry I took so long," the old Vedek murmured.  
"I don't care," said Odo. "You're here *now*."  
The gavel rang again. "I'll hear the Vedek," said Kysha. "How, exactly, do you fit into this mess?"  
"I was part of the expedition that... discovered Odo. He was in a ruined ship, inside a sealed container. Procedure at the time demanded that the contents and container be analysed separately, so I poured what I thought was a strange silica-organic goo into a new container. As I did so, I... sensed something. An awareness of sorts. So... I put my fingers into it and opened myself."  
The Bajorans were nodding, even Kira.  
"I've never encountered such a pure pagh. So clear. He was the Prophet's Call itself. And... then the Cardassians came. He was taken from me. I spent years searching for him... in between my studies. I worried for him."  
"This fraud tried to sabotage my work," cried Mora. "He came to my lab under the pretense of being an assistant!"  
"It wasn't pretense," said Brin. "You only assumed I was there to assist *you*."  
"Brin taught me to talk," said Odo. He had yet to let go of the old man. "I wouldn't be communicating at this level if it wasn't for him."  
"And the first thing he said to our Cardassian supervisor was 'Spoon-head'," said Mora. "We could have all been killed."  
"You made me think Brin *had* been killed," snarled Odo.  
"His name is *TA*brin," corrected Mora.  
"Not on the ship, it wasn't."  
"What ship?"  
"Brin *was* my nickname aboard the expedition. There were three Deeses, so... I got 'Brin'."  
"I remember," said Odo. "Even though I didn't understand at the time."  
The gavel rang out again. "This is not going to turn into a custody battle," announced Kysha. "The Bajoran government is only too eager to push through claims of illegal Cardassian seizure, and since Odo remembers... this court recognizes the prior claim of Vedek Tabrin Dees." The gavel rang for silence. "Doctor Mora Pol... as I recall, experimenting on war orphans is a punishable offence. Consider that, while your former victim considers whether or not to press charges." A final smack of gavel against striker. "Court adjourned."  
"Madame adjudicator..." Moryn Adar gestured for her attention. "While you're here... a small matter." He handed over a datapadd. "A document that slipped the diplomatic pouch."  
Major Kira, temporarily blocked by the crowds, could only burn in restrained fury.  
"This looks a lot like an application for citizenship," she said. "Odo's application for citizenship."  
"A hiccup in the system prevented it from reaching you," Moryn lied with a completely straight face. "I thought it best to skip that part and go directly to the source."  
"Hm," she said, glaring at the 'hiccup'. "I'll read this tomorrow, when I have a clear head."

Two days later.  
"Try it now."  
The circuits hummed to life. Odo didn't need the tricorder to verify that it was working properly. He could feel it. He scanned it anyway, because procedure was there for everyone's safety, and clambered after the Chief.  
Who had gone out the maintenance hatch.  
"Chief?" Odo called. "I thought node twenty-six was this way," he pointed.  
"You better come out here, Odo."  
The tone had beware-of-trouble intonations. He crawled out with his guard up.  
Security Chief Moryn was there, with a junior security goon.  
"What's going on?"  
"You're not attending classes," said Moryn. "It's part of my duty to round up truants." And with that, he handed over a rectangular gift. "And this is yours."  
Odo unwrapped it, even as the junior goon moved into Escort Position.  
"This is--?"  
"Your official certificate of citizenship. I had it framed." Moryn smirked. "Now move along, you're late for school."  
Odo looked back at O'Brien.  
"Go ahead," he said. "I know better than to argue with me wife."

Keiko sighed at the security dispatch with the captured Truants. Once again, Nog was conspicuous by his presence, and the glower that went with it. He was trapped and they both knew it. His Uncle refused to release him from his duties at the bar until Security showed up, and any attempt to sneak out resulted in severe penalties on Nog's father.  
"Take your seat, Nog." Sooner or later, his Uncle would bend.  
Behind him, two more familliar faces. Bajorans, both, a brother and sister from Isolationist parents who barely tolerated their work on the station, and did not approve of schooling by offworlders.  
At least the kids were embaressed by the whole affair, and chorussed, "We're sorry, Mrs O'Brien."  
"I understand."  
And behind them...  
"Odo?"  
"I was... just informed of my citizenship," a half-gesture with a framed document. "And that means I have to follow the rules. It won't happen again."  
"Well, we do have a computer spare. Take a seat and we'll begin." She'd attended his trial. Seen some of the footage of the things that were done to him. Her personal opinion of the Bajorans who gossipped about him had lowered significantly.  
"Those of you who were with us yesterday will remember that we were discussing other cultures outside our own. Since we have a new student today, the rest of you can share your findings... yes, Dava?"  
"Our father wouldn't let us do it," said the Isolationist Son. "He says the only important culture is the one we have."  
His sister Ti raised her hand. "I did one on Tolerationists? Because... they're a different culture, but it's still on Bajor. Papa wouldn't let me write it the way I wanted to."  
"Well, here you can share how you want to."  
Odo was messing around with his console.  
"Odo? It's polite to listen when others speak."  
He put his hands up in a supplicative gesture, murmured, "Sorry," and positioned himself so that he wouldn't be able to see the display.  
_Right,_ Keiko reminded herself. _This is someone who's every waking hour is busy. He's not used to sitting still._ She'd have to test him later for multi-tasking capabilities. She made sure everyone had their turn, even Molly, who's latest fascination was with the Fa'ree. She'd even constructed a light display - with the help of Miles - that mimicked some of their ballets.  
Keiko was privately positive that Molly only liked them because they were pretty. Nevertheless, it was a lever by which she could get some education into the girl.  
Nog's assessment of his chosen outside culture was hinged on how a speculator could make a profit from them.  
After they were done, Keiko moved on with, "Now... what do you notice was in common with all of these projects?"  
"They were boring?" said Jake, to the general amusement of all.  
Odo raised a tentative hand.  
"Yes?"  
"Each observer used their own culture as a reference point. Even though the focus was on what was outside... there were large elements of why it was outside. 'They' don't do things like 'we' do... or, this is similar to 'our' practice... As it were."  
The rest of the class were staring at him. Odo sank down, lowering his hand.  
"Very good, that's exactly right. A common error made by junior xeno-anthropologists is to apply their own culture to something that's alien... but the paradox is that understanding only comes through applying that very same view. Now, how would you avoid errors when encountering a society?"  
Dava put up his hand, "Avoid judgement?"  
Odo remained quiet, at least until free study, when he voiced a small, triumphant noise. Keiko monitored the class from her station. As usual, Molly was looking up did-you-know's on the Fa'ree. Nog was checking stocks and trades. Jake and half the class were tooling around on the galactic text-nets. Dava, of all people, was reading up on Federation history. And Odo...  
Odo was apparently on a ravenous hunt for information. Calling up five, six... okay, an increasing number of subjects at a time. Physiognomy, biology, history, economy... It was fast getting exponential.  
"Odo, you might want to slow down, a little," she warned, getting up to visit his desk. "These computers aren't designed--"  
As it turned out, *that* computer had more than a few failing circuits that crosswired into its power conduit and caused both a minor explosion and a middle-sized conflagration.  
At the time, all Keiko knew about it was a loud noise and the sensation of heat. There was a solid blow to her chest that knocked her backwards, and then there was darkness.

Kira was first on the scene. Fire suppression had knocked out the plasma burst before it got into anything, but the school was still a sooty wreck. She counted heads as the children fled onto the main concourse. _...six... seven... eight... Jake... Nog... the Bolian kid... Molly._  
Keiko was still in there. Kira found her sprawled near the front of the class. Another shape was in the middle of the burned rear. It took Kira a long time to identify it as Odo. It was barely humanoid. She turned the tricorder on Keiko.  
Scan. No broken bones. No internal injuries. Bruising on the upper breastbone. Minor burns.  
Bashir entered, full kit in hand, and went to the shapeshifter.  
"Let it lie, it caused this! You have a real patient over here."  
"Major, anyone who's hurt is a 'real' patient."  
Security and maintenance arrived, both scanning and blocking off the scene.  
"Constable!" Kira ordered. "Charge that... *thing* with sabotage if it wakes up."  
Keiko groaned. "Ow." She felt her chest.  
Kira ran a dermal regenerator over the effected areas. "It's all right. That shapeshifter isn't going to hurt anyone any more."  
"He pushed me away," said Keiko. "The console was approaching instability. I tried to warn him... and it went up. He pushed me away. I think... he pushed some of the others..."  
"He knew it was going to go up?"  
"No. I don't think he did. Or if he did, he only had a few seconds. The look on his face..."  
"We'll be performing a *complete* investigation," said Moryn. "*If* anyone is at fault, *then* they will be charged."  
She paid the creature little heed until she and the injured swept into the infirmary. It was bundled haphazardly into a modified bio-bed where little walls waited in the event of unexpected liquifaction.  
There were no signs of life, other than what the biobed indicated on its screen.  
"Can't you wake it up?" she demanded.  
"Sorry, Major," said Bashir. "There's nothing that I can do. He appears to be in a state he calls a panic-freeze, except his usual biomimetic flux has... vanished."  
"Vanished. He's stuck like that?"  
"I don't know. There's no data like this in Mora's files. The best I can do is try to make him comfortable, and Mora's files... aren't well-filed." He finished with his current patient. "Keep off that foot for a couple of days, you'll be fine. Nurse Pajin will loan you a walking aid." He sighed and picked up a datapadd. "Okay. Temperature control, check. Illumination.... I know it was in here somewhere. Ah!" Triumphant, he adjusted some controls. "Now, if I feed some low-level RF through the lights, I might be able to provide *something* in the order of sustenance..."  
"Can't you... make him liquefy?"  
"There *are* a few chemicals that have that effect, but they're all on the hazardous list. The mildest of them cause extreme stress and discomfort, and frankly, I'm worried they'd kill him."  
Kira gave up arguing with him. "His regenerative cycle's still sixteen hours, right?"  
"Sixteen and a half. The new diet helped."  
"Computer! What's the earliest activity performed by--" _that thing,_ "--Odo in the last eight hours?"  
"Maintenance assistant Odo repaired junction node eighteen at zero seven hundred hours and thirty-seven minutes."  
"Computer, set an alarm to go off sixteen hours after that time index," said Julian. "For both Major Kira and myself."

Fifteen hours, fifty minutes had elapsed. Bashir kept looking at the time, and had only stopped for his most basic needs or the most dire emergencies.  
Every time he closed his eyes, he could see bits of Odo's jumbled mess of a medical file scrolling through his head. He read it every spare minute between wild ideas and failed experiments.  
He was exhausted.  
Julian sipped on his fifth Raktagino in as many hours and tried to stop himself cycling through reworked versions of ancient Earth show tunes.  
"Come on, Odo. We both know you can't hold a shape forever. What do you need? I told you I'd get Mora in here if you couldn't... or I couldn't help you... He's going to be here in a few minutes."  
_I've given you sun's radiation,_ his mind sung, _To get you to thrive. I chilled you right down, like I'm s'posed'a. You're barely alive..._  
He'd tried his own blood in the last bout of insane, inspired desperation. It hadn't done anything. Neither had any of the beneficial compounds he'd been able to swab across Odo's blackening skin. He'd even replicated a chemical compound similar to Odo's native state.  
It wasn't useful. It did exactly nothing for him.  
"And you have the *nerve* to tell me *I* was torturing him!"  
"See?" Julian croaked. "I told you I'd have to get him in here."  
"What did he get into? What did you make him *do*? I tried to tell you he wasn't safe, but you didn't listen!" Mora ranted. "Where was he when this happened to him?"  
"He was attending school," Julian took another swig. "His first day as a free Bajoran citizen... and a defective console just blows up in his face."  
{Chir chir} "Time has elapsed," intoned the computer. "Time has elapsed." {Chir chir}  
And now Major Kira would be heading for this place at warp nine.  
Julian finished off the beverage. He'd have to order it double-strong. It no longer had its kick. "Let's just focus before we have to find out what happens to a shapeshifter who *can't* regenerate, shall we? Leave the recriminations for later."

Kira Nerys could almost taste blood, just like the old days of the resistance when she was so furious she bit her tongue or cheeks. It gave a certain visceral feel to revenge against the spoonheads.  
Now was another telling moment. On the cusp of revealling that lying lump of goo for the inherent traitor that he -- *it*, was. She'd slipped and called it a 'he' last time. No more.  
She couldn't let herself be concerned for the creature. Her concern was the innocent Bajorans it had harmed with its lies and sabotage.  
Kira strode past the arguing doctors and gazed at the mess that was once a shapeshifter. At least they had it behind a shield. The thickening swirls in the atmosphere were worrying, though. "What the hell is this?" she demanded.  
"Atmospheric retention shield," said Mora. "To treat the subject--"  
"*Patient*," corrected Bashir.  
"--with a gasseous form of a formerly tested compound. It *should* introduce the compound in small enough amounts to avoid causing permanent damage. Given the current need for expediency, I felt that increasing the dosage at a quicker rate was necessary... but my *colleague*--" pronounced, 'current drain on my life essences', "--disagrees strenuously."  
"Is this safe to go through?"  
"Oh, it's harmless to carbon-based life."  
Kira grabbed a laser scalpel. "So just cut a piece off. Run it through your forytic analyser or something." She moved to demonstrate.  
There was a small cacaphony from the doctors along the lines of, "It's flammable!" and a rush of clean air filled the space she now shared. Moving slowly. Moving fast turned a simple atmosphere shield into a containment shield.  
Kira grabbed a flake and tugged. Still attached. A quick sweep with the scalpel and it separated easily. "There," she waved it at them. "Take the damn sample and *do* someth--" It moved in her hand. Shapeshifted.  
She vented a noise of disgust and dropped it, unconsciously backing away.  
Right into the shield. Now flicked to containment mode. Damn.  
The dropped fragment soaked into a crack in the shapeshifter's mass. Spreaded. Grew. It moved one of the extended tentacle shapes towards her.  
Even though she was trying to face her fear with Resistance fortitude, her shoulders tried to dig through the shielding.  
The tentacle made a hand. Brushed pseudo-knuckles against her cheek, so lightly...  
And then collapsed into the brownish-ugly goo on the adapted biobed.  
Bashir finally turned off the shields. Mora caught her as she stumbled backwards.  
"He never once touched *me* so caringly," said Mora, more than a hint of jealousy in his voice. Once he was sure she wouldn't fall down, he all but leaped to the biobed readings to have another argument with Bashir.  
Kira let them, one hand on her cheek.  
He-- it-- he-- it--  
He touched her. Like a parent would a child. Or a child a parent.   
Like a lover saying farewell.  
It was a gesture in the parting ceremony. As thanks for the good times.  
What the flying hell had *she* done to him to earn that touch?  
Kira fetched up at the console she kept in her quarters, for when the nightmares were too much and only the stultifying boredom of paperwork could get her to want sleep. Now she was scouring the Bajoran databases for video files associated with Odo's original serial number.  
Some were cross-referenced with potential charges against Mora. Kira played those first.  
Twenty minutes later, she had to stop to throw up.

He had been dying. It hurt too much for that to be happening now. He recognized the vibrations of a regenerator matrix aimed on his liquid form, and tried to stretch himself along the cool surface of the biobed.  
"He's conscious," said Mora. "Can you make yourself into anything?"  
Odo opened the rest of his senses. Mora wasn't holding anything probelike. Good. This was still Deep Space Nine's infirmary. Better. Someone he knew was sitting chaperone. Dax.  
_Good. Better. Best?_  
"I don't think shapeshifting's the best idea," said Dax. "His colour's still... alarming."  
"His biomimetic levels are up to fifty-four percent. You don't know what he's capable of."  
"And neither do you."  
Odo formed enough of a shape to manage, "Flakk off, Mora." So tired. He spread all of himself over the restful cool again.  
Mora chuckled, even as he backed off. "Ever the blunt instrument... I'll stay to assist Bashir in your healing, but - I'll keep my distance."  
"Wow," said Dax. "Kira must've really torn you one. What did she *say*?"  
"That's between her and me," said Mora.  
Odo managed to form the symbols for _Kira_ on his surface, by gathering the darker parts in the right place.  
"Yes, Kira. She won't tell me what got into her, but something changed her mind about you. Who knows, it might last. Would you like me to read to you?"  
Odo wrote on himself, _Yes._  
Dax gestured with a padd. "I thought so." She cleared her throat, "Chapter one, the bride."

Kira came to visit when he could form a humanoid shape again. It was harder to think of him as so completely alien when he was imitating humanoid form.  
He looked very... plastic... when she came to see him. Smooth and shiny.  
"Major..."  
"I owe you an appology," she said.  
"I'm... sorry," he murmured. Each word must have cost him. "I couldn't come... to tweak the rheostat in your... replicator..."  
She'd been wondering who'd been performing minor miracles with her personal replicator. "You just rest. Listen. I made some assumptions about you and never gave you a chance. In the resistance, we heard a few things about what was going on in that place..."  
His hand, trembling and appearing very moist, came to rest on hers. It was oddly dry. Very warm.  
"You took me *out*... of that place. I owe you." He flattened a little. "You saved me. I owe... twice." He rallied, became more solid. "Save me again... and I may have to... marry you."  
She laughed when she wanted to cry, and returned the caress he'd given her. "Just heal. That'll do for now."  
He sighed, relaxing back in the biobed. "As... you... wish."

Odo was a very sick shapeshifter for a week. Dax not only took it onto herself to read to him, but also move him out of the infirmary as soon as she she could. She wouldn't let him walk, but carried him to her quarters, where an odd construction waited in the guest room.  
There was a frame, and suspended inside was a kind of deflated ball, with all manner of attachments to the frame. There was an opening on one side.  
"What *is* that?"  
"A more comfortable bed," said Dax. "Chief O'Brien and I put our heads together and started modifying a Bupangen nursery pouch. We upped its weight tolerance, added some controls inside, and some modified lights to feed you RF emissions while you... relax. There's even audio speakers if you want to listen to something."  
Dax carried him right up to it. "Want to try it out? I figure it's got to be more comfortable than some rigid metal pail."  
Odo flowed out of her arms and into the thing. It sagged alarmingly, yet sprang back and supported him. He reformed his torso so he could pop his head out. "It's... not what I'm used to."  
"But comfortable?"  
"It... feels a little insecure..."  
"That fabric's Danevian woven kaser-silk. You couldn't dent it with a phaser grenade. And, in the event of a hull breach, it's also a survival pod."  
"I see you've thought of everything," said Odo.  
"We tried to." She sat and pulled out the padd. "Where were we up to?"  
"They were just starting to go into the fire swamp. I think... there was something about what fire swamps were."

The door opened.  
"Odo!" Molly ran and jumped onto him, wrapping him up in a hug. "You got better!"  
"Congratulations, lad," O'Brien smiled. "And you too, Jadzia."  
Molly kissed his cheek. "I'm glad you're okay."  
He looked to Dax, who was no help, so he fell back on formality. "Thank you, young miss O'Brien."  
Molly giggled.  
And there was Kira Nerys. Carrying something onto the table. A decorative centrepiece?  
Molly let him go and Odo risked stepping across the threshhold. No explosions of anger. Nothing but the easy patter of family and friends.  
O'Briens. Dax. Kira. He could handle this. It wasn't a party.  
The door chimed. Keiko got it and welcomed Bashir inside. He had a bright box under one arm.  
_Keep calm. Keep calm. This isn't one of *those* parties. This isn't an exhibition. This is just... friends. Gathering together._  
Bashir handed off the box and knelt by Odo. "Are you feeling all right? You're looking... tense."  
"Just... bad memories," he tried to surface from them, but they were clinging to the back of his mind. Crawling through him like Yarbozi ticks. "I'll be fine."  
"Would you like me to give you some medication? Remember? Mora and I discovered a mild relaxant that worked. It should take the stress away while allowing you to... interact."  
But he didn't want to be 'drunk' in a room full of this many people. He might... slip. "No. No. No. I'll... I'll be fine."  
"You're an attrocious liar," said Bashir, scooping him up. "Come on. Sit in the window. It always feels like there's more room when you're staring into space."  
It helped steady his nerves. Or what passed for nerves. He wasn't generating heat at such a fast rate, any more. He was calmer. Cooling down.  
Thank the Prophets that Mora was already down on Bajor. He'd checked. Insisted on seeing Mora onto the shuttle himself. With a polite, and very firm 'goodbye'.  
Sisko entered, Jake by his side. Their bright civillian clothes made him fight for calm all over again.  
It was all coming together. The babble. The bright colours. The laughter. Oh, Prophets, he hated the laughter.  
"...stress fatigue," Kira's words came out of the hubbub. "Just... spread out a little or something."  
Stars. Focus on the stars. Breathe. Calm. Keep calm. _Prophets, help me..._  
She was closer. "There's too many people, isn't there?"  
His breathing was fast. Had to cycle the air quickly. Cool down. "A few," he allowed.  
"Would it help if I said we're all friends?"  
"I... used to think the people at those other parties were friends. I... learned... differently."  
"How can I help?"  
That startled his attention away from the stars. "Nobody... ever wanted to help."  
Kira spread her hands as if to say, _So here I am._  
Time to test how far her sympathies ran. "Nobody... ever wanted to touch me, either." _Not in any good ways..._  
Kira sat beside him and wraped a comforting arm around his torso. He tentatively returned the embrace. He could hear her heartbeat, even snuggled up to her side like this.  
Such an odd, humanoid word. Snuggle.  
Yet it fit.  
So very well.

Kira smiled to herself when he sighed. She could hear a clear combination of relief and deep want satisfied.  
_As the Chief is wont to say, that sigh aught to get me out of a few years worth of Purgatory._ She'd tried to translate it into her own faith, but only ancient humans could ever come up with a concept like a holding zone between heaven and hell, for souls to pay off their minor sins.  
Miles didn't really believe in it, either. He just said things like that because such phrases had been in his family for generations.  
Kira looked down at him. He'd closed his eyes and relaxed into the hug as if he never wanted it to end. She'd thought he was a weapon. What he was was just another abused child who had survived the research centre.  
The new one, Kira knew, had glass walls so that the public could *see* that nothing unethical was going on in there.  
Would he be pleased or distraught by the news? Would he even want to know?  
What he wanted now was nothing more than a hug. She could give that, at least. Each time she saw someone holding him, he clung to them like a burr. As if he was afraid they'd vanish. True enough, he gripped a wrinkle in her uniform top as though it were his last salvation.  
"You saw, didn't you?" he said.  
"If you mean the things Mora did to you... I saw enough."  
"The aggression tests were the worst. They wanted a weapon. I wouldn't let them have it."  
"I guess... you've been fighting the Cardassians just as hard as anyone in the resistance. With no weapons and no hope of escape. That makes you as good as any Captain in the militia."  
He laughed. "Captain Odo... Huh. I suppose this means you have to teach me unarmed combat?"  
"Why stop at unarmed?"  
The smile faded. "I won't be a weapon. I won't touch one. I may learn to stop others doing harm but I will go no further than that. Don't ask me."  
She knew the song, even though the words were different. She'd once vowed, long ago, that the Cardassians could take what they liked, but they would never have her self-respect, her will to survive, or her dignity.  
"I won't," she said. "But I'll teach whatever you're willing to learn."  
His grip relaxed, and Kira made sure she didn't vanish. "Dax has been telling me you're healthy enough to complain, now."  
"Not... complain. More of a process of objections. I feel I can move on my own, she feels more comfortable toting me around like some kind of accessory. So we compromise. I let her carry me around."  
Kira laughed at that. "I can think of a few people who might be jealous of you." A half-nod in Julian's general direction.  
"Dax has that effect on most carbon-based life," Odo observed. "I think she likes to tease them."  
They moved on to gossip, and an easy, companionable way of sitting together. Odo had a dry, wry wit when the mood suited him. Kira found herself smiling more than she was used to.  
"Excuse me," said Dax as she re-entered their orbit. "You're monopolising my date and it's dinner time." And without a by-your-leave, she went to pick him up.  
"I *can* walk, now, Lieutenant."  
"Ah-ah-ah... Jadzia. Everyone's off duty, remember?"  
"Please let me walk?"  
Kira decided to put her oar in. "Go on. It's not like he can trip over much between here and the table."  
Dax sighed. "Fine. But if you wind up paying for this, I reserve the right to tell you I told you so."  
"Duly noted, Lieu-- *Jadzia*."  
He walked, if stiffly, to his appointed chair, and Kira found herself wondering exactly how much damage he was hiding in that simple act.  
_Typical Resistance. Don't admit you're hurt until everyone can see the blood._

Odo stared at what he thought had been a decorative sculpture. "That's... mine?"  
"We scoured the databases for something that'd pass as a cake," said Keiko.  
"Cake," Odo repeated.  
"He doesn't know," said Miles. "Lost track of time, didn't you?"  
"I'm losing track of this conversation," Odo admitted.  
"It's the aniversary of your chosen date of significance," said Bashir. "Happy birthday."  
Aha. Humanoids and their passing-age rituals. They... gathered together to celebrate *his* life.  
Kira watched the chrono. "As of... *now*, you're officially ten years old."  
Several of them took a deep breath.  
"Before anybody starts singing," Odo held them off. "I should explain. I don't know when I was born, or if..." No. Start over. "The date I chose for my forms... was the day I proved my sentience to Mora."  
There was a moment of awkward silence.  
Odo was just about to appologise for ruining the party when Sisko spoke up.  
"Then... happy victory day."  
"Are there any traditional victory songs?" said Kira.  
"Plenty, if you're Klingon," Jake said, rolling his eyes.  
"There *is* one," said Miles "Remember the Starfleet Victory Song?"  
"Oh no," said Dax. "Not that. Be merciful."  
"Starfleet victory song?" said Kira.  
"You'll catch on," said Keiko.  
More collective breaths.  
"You won, you won, you won, you won..."  
And then two of the humans lifted him aloft onto their shoulders, and took him for a rythmic tour of the table. They sat him back down and cheered thrice. At the end of this bizarre ritual, Keiko tapped the top of the 'cake' with something that looked like a fork.  
The entire thing resonated and glowed from within.  
"Oh," he breathed. "It's... too beautiful..."  
"Go on, have some," goaded Miles. "It's not made just for lookin' at."  
At a different part of the table, Keiko was dissecting a carbon-form cake. Someone had written _Congratulations Odo_ on the icing. _Well,_ he thought. _Here's to edible art..._  
The crystal conglomerate he pried loose still glowed and sang in his hand. Nothing harmful. They'd have made sure, but paranoia was a hard habit to kick. He slipped the morsel into his simulated mouth and let it dissolve into his matter.  
It was like... life. Flowing into him. He could feel a thousand old scars just heal over as if they'd never been.  
The shock of it rendered him limp in his seat.  
"Odo!"  
Left arm. Move. Voice. Speak. "I'm fine," he managed. _Ease out of it, boy._ The thought that there was more cake helped. "I just... didn't expect... It's all wonderful." And when he opened his eyes, Kira Nerys was holding his hand. Concerned. He summoned a smile for her. "I'm all right."  
She turned to Bashir, who had his tricorder out.  
"This is amazing... that compound's improved your healing rate fourfold."  
"Doctor, how much is... advisable?"  
He put the tricorder away. "It's your first celebration. You officially have leave to gorge yourself until you regret it."  
"You'll have to pick up the mess," he teased.  
"In these cases? It's a given."

Moryn Adar 'just happened' to stop by the party as they were heaping gifts on the shapeshifter.  
"Where am I going to keep all this?" he was protesting.  
"This should help," he said, handing over a padd. It had a ribbon tied around it.  
Odo keyed it on. "An address?"  
"Your address," said Moryn. "Or, more correctly... *our* address. Vedek Tabrin appointed me your legal guardian on this station. And that requires me to finally get appropriate housing."  
"I don't suppose you'll be spending much time there," said Odo. Those blue eyes could see right through him.  
"Not as much as I'd like. Duty being duty and so forth."  
"I'll make sure your bed is always made," said Odo.  
Moryn bowed. "Happy acceptance."

"Good morning!"  
"Mmmmnnnggghhhh..."  
"I thought Odo was supposed to be regretting last night, old man."  
"So did I," Jadzia yawned. "He ate the whole thing, Ben. Between the party and getting him back." Another jaw-cracking yawn. "He got *hyper*. He wouldn't relax into his native state until I challenged him to. I was up half the night."  
"Is he still--"  
"Bouncing off the walls. I figured he had that much energy, he might as well go back to school. With an appology note to poor Keiko."  
Ben considered how much trouble a hyper humanoid could be and tried to mentally multiply that by shapeshifter.  
"I should send her some flowers."  
"I'm sending her Aaberzan chocolates."

taptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptaptap...  
Odo had a sort of a nervous twitch in one leg and a subtle tremula that kept reminding her of her great-aunt's chihuahua. At least he looked appologetic for the noise.  
"Okay, Odo, I'm going to send a math problem to your console. Just... *try* to restrain that tapping?"  
"Ireallyneedto*do*something..." he quavered. He fell on the problem like one starving for action. Fingers flying on the keys.  
She sighed. The infernal tapping had stopped. She'd reduced the volume output on Odo's console and installed limiter warnings to let him know when he was approaching the machine's limits. It seemed to be working so far.  
"Now, if the rest of us consult--"  
"Done!" said Odo.  
"Already?"  
"It'salldowntobasicshapes, really. Whenyoulookatitproperly, andifIunderstandanything, it'sshapes. Isthereanotherone?"  
Keiko sighed. "You're really not up to sitting still, today." She tapped out a brief message to Moryn on a padd and handed it to Odo. "Take this to Security Chief Moryn and then go see what work Chief O'Brien has for you."  
"Yes'm." He didn't run so much as walk on fast-forward. Odo did, however, pause at the door. "I'mreallysorryIdisturbedtheclass."

"HeyuncleMoryn, MrsO'BriensaidIshouldgiveyouthis."  
Odo was vibrating like a wet horocat. The padd was an official note excusing the shapeshifter from school because of 'unavoidable disruptive tendancies'.  
"What happened to you?"  
"DaxsaidIhadwaytoomuchcakeanditsmakingmehyper. Idon'tunderstandwhythat'sabadthing. I'veneverfeltsogoodinmylife!"  
"It's a bad thing for the rest of us," Moryn allowed. "I'll set word out amongst my staff. You're free to go."  
He watched him go, and tapped his comm badge. "Moryn to Chief O'Brien."  
"O'Brien here."  
"Odo's on his way. You'll need to keep him very busy."  
"Yeah?"  
"Too much cake."

Miles took one look at the way Odo vibrated like a little dog and instantly became very glad he had a long list of things for him to do. That, and he felt he had to find something special for Keiko to make it up to her.  
"I heard about the trouble."  
"Ididappologise. DidIappologiseenough? MaybeIshouldgobackand--"  
"No. Leave it 'till this evenin', eh? Now it happens you got a lot of energy to burn off and I have a list of things I'd rather not be fixin'. It's all well within your skill set so you should be all right doing this on your own. Here's your list and your kit. Don't lose either."  
"Iwon'tletyoudownchief!" Odo saluted, setting something on his right ear sparkling in the light.  
"Is that an earring?"  
"BrinsentitupfromBajor. HemadeitouttasomeofthewreckageIwasfoundin. Saiditwasacommonsymbol. Isn'titgreat?"  
"I'll look at it later when you can stand still," Miles smirked. "Go on, off you go."  
The boy sped off, eager to please and happy to use his pent-up energy.

Dax was gently snoring at her station in Ops and the rest of the crew were studiously ignoring her napping. They'd heard about the shapeshifter whirlwind by now and were being merciful to the poor, exhausted Trill.  
The turbolift whirred to a halt.  
"IgottaworkordertotweakthereplicatorsinOps?"  
Dax lurched into consciousness with, "I swear that's not my banana!"  
Kira grinned in spite of herself. "You'd better start with Sisko's office."  
"Iwasgoingto," he hopped down the stairs. Literally. "There'sthreeglitchesinhisdeskconsole, tworeplicatorbugsandasignalerrorinthesidedoor. ThingshavebeengoingfastersinceIre-organisedthechief'slistbyregion."  
"Is that an earring?" said Anara.  
"Yeah, BrinsentitupfromBajor, isn'titgreat? NowIreallyfeelBajoran!" He leaped up the stairs to Sisko's office and pressed the door chime.  
"Hicommander, Ihaveaworkorder. Actually, IhaveseveralworkordersandIthoughtI'dgetthemallouttatheway."  
The door shut, and less than five minutes later, Sisko was out. "What happened to him?"  
"Too much cake," said Dax. "Remember?"  
"I haven't seen anything like it..." he murmured. "He works faster than a Matami Hypernaut, and the *chatter*..."  
"He wouldn't shut up for me, either," Dax murmured, her eyes already closing.  
The door opened again. "IthinkIgotit, Commander. Ifyou'ddoubletestwhileItweakthereplicatorouthere?" More jumping down the stairs. "Thelistofproblemsonthisoneleadsmetosuspecttheflavourmodule'sburningout. Theydothatwhenareplicator'soverused. Ifitis, Icanhaveitreplacedinajiffy. Ifitisn't, thenit'sprobablythepatternbuffers. Thosethingscangosidewayssoonaslookat'em." During this speech, he had the access panel off, and was deep inside the workings. "HeywowIfoundavole! Itwaschewingonthecircuits, itdoesn'tlookveryhealthy." He bought it out into the open. "Pleasetellmeit'snotdead?"  
Anara scanned it. "Stunned," she pronounced. "And injured."  
Odo zoomed over to the science station. Jumping down stairs and leaping up. He placed it in front of Dax. "HeyDaxIfoundasickvole! CanItakeittoDoctorBashirandthentakeithome? I'lllookafteritmyselfandcleanit'senvironment, Iswear. I'vebeentryingtobegoodallday, canIkeep'impleaseMama?" Odo gasped, stiffened, and put both his hands over his mouth.  
Dax, fighting the screaming hordes of weariness, blinked muzzily at him. "What'd you call me?"  
"I'msorryIgotworktodo! Canyoulookafterthevole'tillIgetback? Thanksverymuch!"  
He turned and hopped down a stair, but something went awry mid-bounce. Odo's expression went blank, his body stiff. When he landed, he simply toppled forward and went from vertical to horizontal with a solid {thwud}.  
Without thinking, Kira scooped him up and felt his neck for a pulse. Then his chest for a heartbeat. Then his left ear for a Pagh.  
It hit her like lightning. Call of the Prophets, indeed. Even the Butcher of Bajor would take up the robes if he could feel a Pagh like *that*.  
"He's still alive," she said, her voice shaky. "I'll--" _Need to sit down. Preferably in the Temple._ "--get him to the infirmary." She worked her other arm under his legs and tried to lift him.  
Tried being the operative word. It was like trying to lift something that was bolted to the deck plating.  
Dax stirred herself enough to try and help. "Oof! What *is* this? I've carried him hundreds of times."  
"Doctor Bashir, report to Ops. Medical... situation... in Ops."  
Between the five people there in Ops, they managed to wrestle him next to the turbolift. Bashir arrived shortly with a lev pallet.  
"Thought so," he said. The tricorder came out, scanned. "The good news is, it's not a complete... lockdown, like last time. The scans don't exactly match a panic-freeze..."  
"He's not breathing," said Kira. It was the thing that panicked her the most.  
"He doesn't have a respiratory system as we understand it. He just... breathes as a sort of air-cooling strategy. Or a means of talking easier. It was never fully explained." He paused to attempt to scry meaning from his readings. "Either way, it's not an immediate cause for alarm." He looked at his readouts, hit the tricorder and scanned again.  
"Sure, things *always* work better when you hit them," muttered Dax.  
"Okay. Onto the lev pallet, I'll get him to the infirmary."  
"On three. One. Two."  
"HUP!"

The tricorder didn't tell him much. The biobed didn't tell him much. Closer scans... were seemingly coming up with naughts.  
Odo gasped in a breath and opened his eyes in the same instant.  
Bashir, in that same instant, tried not to wet his shorts.  
"Ah," he sighed. "Welcome back."  
Odo vented a sound somewhere between a sigh and a groan. "I was in Ops... Did I... happen... to anything?"  
"No. Apparently you were excited about finding a vole inside the replicator's workings and then..." Julian shrugged. "You did a face-plant right in the middle of Ops." He supplied helpful gestures, punctuating the inevitable collision with a clap. "How do you feel, now?"  
Odo closed his eyes for a minute. "Better," he said. "Better than ever."  
"I must say your new baselines are *fascinating*. I'd like you to come back tomorrow, just to make certain nothing... sinister is going on."  
"You don't need me to stay?"  
"Considering how little there is I can actually *do* for you... yes. Take it easy, don't stress yourself, and watch out for any symptoms I *can* treat."  
"Thank you, Doctor."  
Julian didn't watch him go. He was busy studying the DNA on his screen. Fascinating. It was almost as if it was healing itself of some ancient damage...

Keiko was surprised to see Odo file in with the rest of the class after lunch break. "I thought you were gone for the day. What is that?"  
"I'm... over my distubing behaviour, Mrs O'Brien and this..." he gestured with the large plastic box and the creature inside, "is a Cardassian vole. I rescued him from some circuits up in Ops and he needs... care."  
Most of the younger students clustered around.  
"Euw, it's ugly."  
"Cooooolllll..."  
"Hey, it's missing a leg."  
"Oom-maaaah... it did a poo!"  
"Why's it sniffing?"  
Keiko mentally threw that day's lesson plan out the nearest airlock and changed the central display. "Okay. Let's talk about Cardassian voles. The most obvious feature is that voles are hexapedal, meaning they have six legs."  
"But he's got five," said Ton, the Bolian.  
"Yes, this vole lost his leg some time ago," said Keiko. "You can still see the stump where the missing leg was."  
Jake raised his hand. "Can we call him 'Stumpy'?"  
Debate broke out almost immediately over the vole's name.  
_Great. Now we have a class pet._ The Bajorans favoured calling it Dukatt, or Garak, or any other number of Guls who had formerly opressed them or their families. Molly wanted to call him 'Princess' in the face of obvious evidence to the contrary.  
The only one who hadn't entered the debate was Odo.  
"Odo? Do you have a name for the vole?" Keiko prompted.  
"Wakan," said Odo.  
A Bajoran word for stealth, cunning, and a certain element of vile character. Almost perfect for a vole.  
It started another round of debate, but eventually, the votes leaned towards 'Diba', one of the many Bajoran synonyms for filth. Bajorans had no native love for the introduced Cardassian wildlife. Keiko could settle for fascination, though.

Home. Family. Opportunity. Friends. Everything he'd wanted, he'd earned.  
Odo considered his reflection. A shape he wore for convenience's sake. Overdue for a change, now that his circumstances had. He didn't need cuteness to get by. He had people to vouch for him.  
And yet...  
Too abrupt a change would only alienate them all over again.  
Odo stretched himself into an adult shape, unconsciously donning the green-and-grey uniform of an engineering assistant.  
Not bad. Face needed a lot of work. He added dips and curls to the ears. Wrinkles to the nose.  
Five or six ridges? Five. Six made the nose too crowded. Lips were still thin, and the face was too smooth. It looked a lot more Bajoran than his usual visage. Should he try for eyebrows? His imitation of them looked... awkward. He could work on them in his private moments.  
Odo took a holo of the finished product. Not *quite* Bajoran. Maybe Bajoran enough? Now... to extrapolate between-stages. If he 'grew into' this shape. Practiced it in his private moments to refine the detail...  
The real trick would be 'growing' slow enough to serve humanoid needs for continuity, while also sating his desire to achieve a level of respect.  
Then again, young Mr Sisko was currently growing so fast Odo could *see* it happening.  
The door chimed. Odo resumed his everyday shape - slightly altered towards his goal - to answer it.  
'Uncle' Moryn.  
"Stopping by for breakfast?"  
"I ate at the replimat. Isn't it almost time for school?"  
"It's the weekend. School isn't open, today."  
He came in like an invader. Snooping. "Two beds in the guest room?"  
"In case Brin wants to visit."  
"And... the rest?"  
"I practice shapeshifting. It's... like meditation."  
"Even this?" Moryn tapped a large plastic warren, then startled as something inside moved.  
"Oh, that's for Wakan Diba."  
"The vole."  
"Yes."  
Moryn appeared to be having trouble with this. "You gave a Cardassian vole a Bajoran name."  
"Well... everyone agrees on the 'Diba' part." Odo salted the plastic labyrinth with treats for the creature to find. "I rescued him, I can call him what I like."  
Moryn glared at the vole. "And this is a permanent arrangement?"  
"No. We... share him. Everyone gets a turn looking after him on the weekends. I suspect young Miss O'Brien will put him in pink ribbons."  
Moryn chuckled. "Probably." He poked the structure, making an exercise wheel turn. "Speaking of the O'Briens... do you have any plans, today?"  
"None that can't be changed. What's going on?"  
"Something of a family outing. Parents and guardians pooling their resources to take a day in a holographic playground."  
Odo suspected where this was going. "Let me guess. Mrs O'Brien handed you something of a psych-evaluation?"  
"Odo needs to learn how to play with others," Moryn quoted.  
He smirked. "I'm not doing the Cardassian Neck Trick."  
"No-one said you had to," said Moryn.

Odo had not heard of Narnia, nor the secret garden. His own knowledge of classic Bajoran stories was woefully lacking, so he didn't know about the door to Aghan either. He had nothing to compare to stepping from Quark's dingy corridors and into another world but that exact experience. The Bajoran children around him gaped. The Cardassian war hadn't left much in the way of vegetation on Bajor, let alone forests.  
A few wept, reverentially touching the luxurious greenery around them. One climbed straight up the nearest tree.  
Her grandchildren might get the chance to do something like that on Bajor, one day.  
"Move along," intoned Moryn. "You're blocking the door, move along. There's plenty more trees to look at. Keep moving. Keep moving..."  
"You'd think they'd never seen a forest before," scoffed Jake Sisko.  
"They haven't," said Odo. "Most of Bajor's a burned mess."  
"Sorry," said Jake as he fell into step with Odo. "I'm used to hearing about how well the reclaimation projects are going and--"  
"They're reclaiming fields," said Odo. "Right now, food's more important than forestry." He took in Jake's dejected look, and allowed, "But this," he gestured at the holographic canopy surrounding them, "might help change some minds."  
"Don't they know a planet needs forests?"  
"The people also need to eat," said Odo. "If it wasn't for a feral Cardassian lichen, we'd have been begging Starfleet for atmos--" the sunshine hit his skin like an eager lover. Odo closed his eyes and sighed.  
"What is it? What's the matter?"  
"The *sun*... feels so beautiful."  
A shadow loomed. Odo opened his eyes to glare at the interloper, only to discover a blue... thing... grinning at him. Odo hadn't been this alarmed since the Costume Party Incident. He instinctively backed away, dropping into a basic defensive stance, according to Kira's sporadic drills. "What are you supposed to be?" he demanded.  
"Flotter T. Water, the third, Esquire," it bowed. There was a lot of excess movement that had Odo twitching. "Just a water sprite of some import. Have you seen my pond?"  
Odo was battling flashbacks. "...i'mnotgoinganywhereorlookingatanything..."  
"It's okay," soothed Jake. "It's just a dumb holonovel for kids. He's harmless."  
"I don't bite," he said, grinning wide. "See? No teeth."  
"I never had to worry about *teeth*," Odo muttered. Remembering the psych evaluation, he followed the bizarre blue thing. Jake followed with a worried expression.  
"Is it me, or is that research centre you used to be in sounding worse every time you mention your past?"  
"It wasn't just the research centre," said Odo. "The Cardassians had a large part in it as well."  
"Just like everything nasty that happened to Bajor. I think I'm getting the pattern."  
The pond was like something out of a picture book. Not that Odo had seen that many. In fact, he'd seen only one, and that very briefly... when Mora had left a child's edition of _Dear Green Place_ in the lab so he could answer the comms. In there, was a picture very much like this one.  
It was a slice of paradise.  
Even in Mora's lab, the image of the water called to him. Something primal inside said, _Home!_ Odo found it the focus of his full attention. He walked right up to it, knelt. What did he expect? Welcome? Odo put his hand into the water, and it broke the spell.  
It was just water.  
There were fish in it. And amphibians of some variety.  
"Excuse me," said the pompous Flotter. "That happens to be *my* water."  
"Really," said Odo. He let his fingers play in it. A curious fish swam up, lipped a digit, and swam away again. "Is it *always* your water?"  
"Huh? What? Yes!"  
"Even when it evaporates and goes somewhere else?"  
Jake Sisko had taken up a fly-on-the-wall position by the tree. He was smirking in malevolent glee.  
"Uh. Yeah," said Flotter.  
"And by that extension, I suppose that it's your water before it falls down as rain, into your pond?"  
"Of course!" Flotter rallied, puffing himself up. "It's just coming home."  
"Cardassian thinking," muttered Odo.  
Flotter made a face. "Uh... What?"  
"Suppose for a second that you could gather *all* the water in this environment into your pond. Think about that. There's water in the trees, in the animals, the birds... even the clouds and the earth... You'd take all that, wouldn't you? Make it your pond?"  
"Uhm..."  
"If you did, you wouldn't have a pond, you'd have an ocean. The fish, amphibians and the other life forms would be crushed by the pressure."  
"That's horrible," said Flotter. "I couldn't hurt my fish... They need me."  
"So it's their water, too."  
"I'm... prepared to be magnanimous. Yes. It's their water." A beat. "But it's mostly mine."  
"And if my friend, over there, gets thirsty? If he needs a drink? Would you insist that it's your water then?"  
"No. I'm not mean..."  
"So what do you really mean when you say it's 'your' water?"

"...and then he burst into tears!" Jake laughed as he set up the table. "He picked out every single inconsistency in the whole holonovel in nothing *flat*. It was-- it was-- It was *poetic*. You should have seen it, Dad."  
"Sounds like Odo's a little more mature than his apparent age," said Sisko. "He might be a good friend."  
"You mean 'better than Nog'."  
Sisko blew air through his cheeks. "I'm your Dad. I'm *supposed* to worry about the influence your friends have on you. And, let's be frank, Nog is... troublesome."  
"Nog is *fun*. He knows how to do all this cool stuff, Dad. He's the only kid even close to my age on this station and you're not being very fair."  
"Who said parents had to be fair?"  
"*Da-ad*..."  
Sisko laughed. "All right, so if I'm not being fair... what do you have against Odo?"  
"He's... weird."  
"Weird."  
"It's like he's watching everything all the time. Taking notes. But when he knows what he's supposed to do? He just kinda... takes charge. It's... weird."  
"Think about things from his perspective," offered Sisko. "He's not even remotely like us. Every move he makes, he's had to learn in order to fit in. And every time he gets it wrong..."  
"It'd creep out the people who know how it's supposed to go. And he wasn't really *raised*, even. He was an experiment."  
"Which would naturally lead to a certain amount of... 'weird', wouldn't it?"  
Jake sighed. "Fine. I'm gonna make an effort."

"This is it?"  
"I told you this was a stupid idea," hissed Nog.  
"Just give him a chance," Jake insisted. "There's people-watching, too."  
"The women," said Nog with a smirk.  
Both humanoids had their legs over the edge. Odo had copied their elbows-akimbo upper-body resting position on the lower rail, but his legs remained curled in a crouch.  
"Isn't your position... precarious?"  
"Not *that* much," said Jake, swinging his feet.  
Nog scoffed. "Your uncle makes it his business to keep us from, 'dangling on the Promenade'... it's stupid. Why shouldn't we dangle?"  
"I can think of two hundred different scenarios that could result in a fall from that position," said Odo. "When humanoids break... or leak... it isn't nice."  
"Okay, teeyemiy," muttered Jake. "Look, it's not really that dangerous. Try it. It's fun."  
"Fun," repeated Odo, very dubious. He ventured one foot to dangle. Then the other. While not afraid of heights, he kept envisioning those two hundred scenarios happening, somehow. And fearing what would happen if he tried to prevent injury.  
Nevertheless... having a body part dangle... was an interesting sensation. He tried swinging his feet, just a little. Peculiar. But not... unenjoyable.  
"See? Now you're--"  
"Mister Sisko... Please tell me you're not leading my nephew into bad habits?"  
All three stood. And then Jake Sisko said exactly the wrong thing.

"I was just showing him how to be normal," said Jake.  
Odo went from zero to unbridled fury in picoseconds. "Define 'normal'," he shouted, then pushed through them and ran away.  
"What?" Jake wondered.  
"Really, Mister Sisko..."  
"What? Why're you blaming me for this?"  
Constable Moryn glared down at him. "Because you have no idea how hard it is to find a shapeshifter when he doesn't want to be found. When I come back to the upper level, I don't want to see you on it." He hurried after his adopted nephew... and straight into a Situation.

"Are you all right?" said the stranger.  
"Uh..." said Odo. "Sorry. I was... trying to get away." His curious gaze took in the strager's features... and the gun lying on the deck. "I thought weapons were banned on the Promenade."  
"That's the last of my worries," said the stranger.  
Raised voices from a nearby holosuite. An anguished expression on the stranger's face. The all-too-familliar sillhouette of Uncle Moryn coming in at Warp Speed.  
All this, Odo took in in seconds, then seized the strangers' hand and bolted with him through the crowds. "Forget the weapon. You never saw it, you never touched it, understand?"  
"But-- I--"  
Scuffling behind them. Uncle Moryn had encountered some half-scene that Quark had concocted to allay his own guilt and appear the victim at the same time.  
Odo urged the stranger down the stairs. "Listen, my Uncle's the security chief, here. Right now, you don't have a better friend. Trust me. The best place to be is as far from this mess as you can get." He seized the man's hand again, lead him out a back door and into one of the more innocuous nooks on the Promenade.  
"But he--"  
"Promised to help you out? If you just did one thing for him?"  
"How did you know?"  
"Quark is a con-man, Mr--?"  
"Croden. Just Croden."  
"Croden. He'd do anything to get everything you own, then use you as a patsy when you run dry."  
"But I don't have anything."  
"Take my advice, Mr Croden. As soon as you see Moryn taking someone to the security office, follow him and turn evidence. You might even get a reward. If you need income, there's hundreds of jobs on this station. I can help. I could--"  
More yelling. One yelp in particular. Jake's friend Nog. He'd been tipped from his perch by the fight between Moryn and some Miradorns. Jake was calling to him, trying to reach the young Ferengi's flailing hand.  
No time.  
Damn their fears.  
He would not let anyone get hurt because of what he could have done.  
Odo stretched himself, further and faster than he'd ever done before. Across the distance between himself and the fall-zone. Puffing himself out in a large pillow.  
Catching the boy just as he fell.  
Jake followed via the stairs.  
"Are you okay?"  
"Where'd this...?"  
Odo allowed his body to melt, re-shaping into today's humanoid form. Apparently out of breath from the excess heat shapeshifting generated.  
Nog shrank away.  
"You're welcome," said Odo. He closed his eyes to the staring. Tried to shut his ears to every gasp and murmur. Thus, he was surprised by a hand on his shoulder. Jake Sisko's.  
The human was smiling. "*I'm* grateful, okay? You saved my friend."  
Croden had followed him, wearing an expression somewhere between Stunned Mullet and Awed Reverence. He had a white-knuckled grip on his jewellery.  
"Spirits," he whispered. "A *Changeling*. A real Changeling. *Here*?"  
Four security goons boxed the four of them in.  
"Chief Moryn would like to have a little chat," said their leader. Boyajian.  
"My father's going to kill me," murmured Jake.  
"My Uncle's gonna dock my pay," groaned Nog.  
And yet, for all the boy's understandable need to alienate him, they walked with him. In step.  
And they shielded him from the starers and the pointers.  
Croden was whispering something in his own language. He appeared... star-struck.  
They were lead to the centre table in the cells. Sat down. The Miradorns and Quark were in separate holding cells. The gun and the artifact were placed in front of Moryn.  
"Is that a gun?" said Odo. "I thought weapons were banned on the Promenade."  
Moryn sighed. "You don't dissemble well, Odo."  
Odo imitated a small, clearing-throat noise and shrank into his seat.  
Moryn held the weapon aloft. "I know what this is. What I'd like to know is how it got onto my Promenade."  
Croden looked to Odo, who gave him an encouraging nod. "The Ferengi gave it to me. Said it was a Compressed Tetrion Beam weapon, and it wouldn't set off the Promenade sensors. He told me that if I stole that... artifact," he pointed to it, "from the Miradorns, he'd help me... get something from the Gamma Quadrant. If I gave it straight to him once the Miradorns were arrested."  
"Traitor," shouted Quark.  
The Miradorns added their own protests to the uproar.  
Moryn pressed a button and the prisoners could still be seen, but no longer be heard. Moryn smirked at the effect, then sobered. "Now. About the... *other* disturbance on my Promenade?"  
Odo stood. "It was my fault! I failed to warn them adequately. I-- I don't know what else I could have said, but-- I should have tried harder. I failed. I'm sorry."  
Jake stood. "I'm the one who just sat back down. Nog said we should go looking for Odo, but I--"  
"No, *I* am the one who just sat down," interrupted the Ferengi. "Don't trust this hew-mon, he's too noble for his own good. Besides, it was me who did the falling. Blame me! I'm used to it!"  
Moryn held up a hand for silence. "Stop. Listen." A deep breath. "I have been attempting for weeks to restrain your... dangling, and we *all* know how effective that is."  
Jake and Nog exchanged glances. Both with each other and Odo.  
"I *trust* today's incident will emphasise the importance of my concerns regarding your well-being?"  
"Yessir," the humanoid boys chorussed.  
"And Odo?"  
"Yes?"  
"Normal is as normal does. Figure *that* out."

The boys fetched up at the replimat. Each holding some variety of calming beverage, though Odo held a mug he'd shapeshifted out of himself and filled with himself.  
"I thought you didn't drink," said Jake.  
"I don't. This..." he tipped the mug visibly, but kept the liquid inside... inside. "It's me."  
"Cooooll," murmured Jake.  
"What *else* can you do?" said Nog.  
Odo reverted to his usual guarded hunch. "Why do you want to know?"  
Jake swatted him. "You idiot, you saw the holos..."  
"Maybe I should go," Odo began to sidle away.  
"No. Stay," said Jake, holding down one of Odo's arms. "Please. We can sort this out, okay?"  
Nog fought with himself before saying, "Sorry. I thought it was years ago... and... that you wanted to show off."  
Odo relaxed into confidence again. "Sometimes... years ago is just a blink away."  
"I get it," said Nog. "There's this Bajoran techie who lives near us? Sometimes... we hear him screaming. Just hit me if I say something stupid, okay?"  
"I... can't... go that far."  
"I'll hit him for you," said Jake. "And I promise I won't hurt him."  
The funerial mood evaporated, and they fell to discussing passers-by.

"Everybody, we have a new student, today. Say hello to Yareth. She'll be staying with us while her father's working on this station."  
Odo's initial impression of her was that she was considerably neater than her father. And quieter.  
"Uhm," she began when asked to tell about herself. "I come from a planet called Rokhar... My father and I are... political refugees. Uh. Our government deals with dissention by killing entire families. My father and I were the only ones to escape. Uhm. My father says there's a real Changeling here... I only ever heard stories about them, but... I'd like to meet him too."  
Nog whispered in his ear. "You could score *her*."  
"Shut it," Odo murmured back.  
"Well that fits neatly with todays topic," said Mrs O'Brien. "Myths and legends. Stories. The stories people tell each other are very important. They tell a lot about the culture of the storytellers..."  
Odo, pretending to study, looked up the few Changeling stories newly entered into the information database.  
It didn't bode well.  
Either his people were needlessly ruthless and had taught the Rokhari a hard lesson... or the Changeling's own nature had been filtered through Rokhari ruthlessness as some kind of scapegoat.  
_Villains or victims... which would you prefer?_ One data point did not a good extrapolation make. _Patience, boy. The truth will out._  
"Why do you wear that symbol?" Yareth whispered.  
"Mmm?"  
"Your earring."  
He'd almost forgotten. The symbols Bajorans chose for their earrings bore very little comment unless it was about political differences or blood feuds. "Oh. It was a common symbol on the wreckage I was found in."  
"That's a *Changeling* symbol." She leaned closer. "Are you *him*?"  
Mrs O'Brien had to raise her voice. "Do you two have something you want to share? Something *towards* today's lesson?"  
Odo cringed in his place. Every day, he fought to learn with the others in class, and every day he wound up inadvertantly disrupting a lesson.  
Yareth stood. "I'm sorry. It was my fault. I guess... I'm just excited."

"Don't look now," said Jake, "but you have a shadow."  
"Everyone has a shadow," said Odo. "It comes from standing in the light."  
"I *mean* someone's following you. That new kid, Yareth."  
Odo stopped, turned to face her. "Can I help you?"  
"Father says you really are a Changeling."  
"So?"  
She blushed. "I... kinda owe you my life."  
Odo nodded. "That's the kind of debt you have to pay forward. Help wherever you can, and live a good life."  
"That's all?"  
"It's harder than it sounds."

Two weeks later, there was a small crowd waiting for him at a maintenance access way as he crawled out. He gathered his equipment, stowed it and replaced the cover... all under their amazed and watchful gaze.  
"Ladies. Gentlemen," he bowed in the Bajoran manner. "Is there something I can assist you with?"  
"You are the Changeling," said their spokesperson.  
Odo blinked, noticing. These were all people from the Gamma Quadrant. "That's what Mr Croden believes. I'm not so sure." He checked his datapadd for the next job.  
"We checked public records. You *are* the Changeling."  
So that's what the writers meant when they said someone could feel their heart drop. Vertigo without falling. Sinking without unstable ground. "I'm glad there's a consensus," he managed without emotion. "Now, if you'll excuse me..."  
One of them grabbed his arm. "My daughter died from Aksaya Syndrome!"  
"I... had nothing to do with that," said Odo.  
"The Changelings left it in their wake. They said they would cure us! And then they left! Why did you *leave*?"  
"I don't know. I don't remember that..."  
"We loved you," said another. "We worshipped you."  
"I'm a techie, not a God!" Odo tried to wriggle free.  
"Where did you *go*?"  
"Where were you when we needed you?"  
"Why didn't you help us?"  
Too many of them had their hands on him. Too many. Too close. Odo liquefied, arcing free of the cluster. "I. Don't. Know! I know less about my people than any of you! All I know is the more I hear about Changelings, the less I like them!"

Breathe. Centre.  
"[Prophets guide my path,]" Odo murmured in High Bajoran. "[Show me the steps I must take... to resolve this conflict.]"  
Breathe. Centre. Be.  
Whispers. "How long has he been like that?"  
"I came in an hour ago, he was praying then."  
"I saw him go in some hours before that."  
"Thank goodness the crowds respect the temple monks... This could turn ugly."  
"It's going to turn ugly when Odo sets foot back out there."  
Sigh.  
Odo let his hands drop. "Let me guess. Those eight Gamma Quadrant citizens have... followed me to the temple."  
"Eight? There were twenty the last time I looked," said Kira.  
"It's got worse since then," said Dax.  
"How many?" said Odo.  
"I had to make my way through a veritable throng," said his Uncle. "They're clogging the Promenade."  
"A throng," said Odo.  
"Word must've got out," said Sisko. "Like it or not, you're a god to these people."  
Odo turned away from the altar. "I can't help them like that. I can't... do... the things they want. I can't be their God, I can't..." he sighed. "I can't disappoint them, either."  
"Croden started this, he's going to get the butt end of it," said Kira. "We're appointing him administrator of Changeling Affairs in the Alpha Quadrant. Any petitions to you have to go through him."  
"And us," said Sisko. "At the very least, it can... lighten the strain."  
"And what about the things none of us can do?" Odo asked. "Before I came here... a woman had lost her baby. She was determined I could help her... reanimate it." _And then she'd asked me to give her another one..._ He'd never mention that part. Ever.  
"We'll find a way."  
"*I* have a way." He ran for the doorway. Shapeshifted. Took flight to the awed gasp of the throng currently clogging the Promenade. Landed on the upper level and re-shaped himself. "Listen! Please! I know you view me as some... powerful creature who can make anything happen. I am not like that. I don't know the first thing about my own people. Or even *if* a single word of these legends is true. I'm just a techie. I'm not that important. I can't help you." They all looked up at him as if he were killing their dreams. "I'm sorry."  
And they still protested. Offered their money. Their blood. Their families. Their lives.  
"No. Stop it. When I say I can't, I *mean*, I *can't*. Nothing you do can change it."  
They just protested louder.  
They wouldn't listen.  
It was as if the Promenade was filled with a thousand Moras, all demanding their own trick. One he'd never practiced.  
"He's telling the truth," said one voice in the many. "I go to school with him! I've never seen him do a single miracle." It was Yareth. "He's not like the stories. He's just a kid."  
Somehow, it made him feel even worse. He gripped the railing and watched as each potential supplicant looked up at him as if their world was dying all over again, looked away, and slowly abandoned the Promenade.  
_Prophets help me, I *want* to be able to help them..._

An agonizing week and a half later, he found a solution in six degrees. It wasn't what one knew, or who one knew, but who *they* knew and who those people knew. And so forth until he reached someone of influence.  
What it had to do with bacon eluded him.  
All he had to do was remain polite, civil, explain the situation and remember to disconnect if anyone sneered at him.  
And, after another agonizing fortnight, it began working. He could not help those who had lost families, but he could help the survivors to find new lives in new places. He couldn't give them wealth, but he *could* give them options. At least, thanks to Starfleet medical, he could give them health. Or as much help as science could allow.  
Then, for a glorious month, the semi-reverential crowds actually *thinned*. He could start to feel at ease at work or in school.  
And then the Vorta came.

Odo took one look at the new alien in the corridor and sighed. "I have a schedule to keep. Please route all requests through Changeling Administrator Croden."  
"I already have."  
_Prophets... not one of *those*..._ He was going to regret this, he knew, and yet he had to ask. "And what did you request?"  
She smiled. "My name is Kyalla, and I came to serve."  
"Serve," said Odo. He wondered if he should run now and save time.  
"My people have a long history of serving the Changelings. I am yours to command and use."  
Odo picked up his kit. "I don't use people."  
"I only wish to serve," said Kyalla.  
Odo checked his chrono. Almost time for school. Mrs O'Brien was going to give him the Look. It was a Look that promised multiple talking-to's in his future. From his uncle, from Brin, from Dax and the Chief... and maybe even Jake and Commander Sisko as *well* as Mrs O'Brien herself. And shaking this particular self-adhered attache was counter-productive.  
"I have to go to class. You are *not* to interfere."  
"As you command, Most Honoured."  
"My name is Odo. Please use it."  
"I will endeavour, Most-- (hem) Odo."  
He sighed. It was going to be a very long cycle.

Odo was practically begging her not to ask about his new shadow with his eyes. Therefore Keiko ignored the alien and made sure everyone was present.  
After Nog arrived, care of the truant patrol, she began. "Today, we're looking at important ancient civilisations. Ones that had influence on modern cultures. Can anyone name something from their own planet's past?"  
Daba put up his hand. "The ancient Bajoran Tangtang empire?"  
Odo piped up. "I always found the Juma'i more interesting."  
"There's no right answers," Keiko began.  
The alien put her oar in. "There are always right answers," she said, "and the Most Honoured Changelings provide them."  
Odo turned to glare at her. "This is a place of learning. Leave your propaganda at the door."  
The alien looked momentarily shellshocked, then shut her mouth with an audible click.  
"The fact is," said Keiko, "multiple past cultures can have an influence on present day culture. Ancient religious practices carry forward, long after the religion itself has faded into disuse. For instance. How many Bajorans here know why your earrings are different shapes for different families?"  
They were all mystefied. Some touched their own or looked at another's as if confirming it for the first time.  
"It's because of the influence of the Kajong, a band of trader nomads who travelled all over Bajor. Their own religious books decreed that they wear tribal markers for all to see, so they wouldn't risk inbreeding. Over time, it became traditional for families to wear similar symbols. Some of the more ornate earrings not only trace personal status and achievement, but reflect some elements of the wearers' family history."  
More earring-checking amongst the class.  
"Now, let's look at some of the more common symbols we can find, and what they mean..."

Odo was trying to be a proper host to his self-invited guest. He had to be patient with the Gamma Quadrant worshippers until they realised he was just a kid and moved on with their lives. This one was just... more personal than most.  
"...even some Gamma Quadrant deliacies in here. What would you like?"  
"Why debase yourself?"  
"Pardon?"  
"You lower yourself. I should be serving you. Not the other way around."  
"You declared yourself my guest," said Odo. "Now you have to put up with my hospitality."  
Sigh. "As you command." Kyalla peered over his shoulder to study the extensive menu. "The -ah- Pak'taji seems safe enough."  
Watery porridge for invalids. A very paranoid choice. "You should check in with Doctor Bashir," he advised, dailling up her choice, with some cool water. "He'd be able to give you a complete list of ingredients that should be safe... and those to avoid." He handed her a tray, then collected his own. "He helped me, too."  
"You let a *solid* examine you? Test you?"  
"Do you see any *Changeling* doctors around here?"  
Kyalla bit her lip. "I see your point, Most-- Odo."  
Odo gestured her towards a nearby table. "Sooner or later, you have to trust someone. I've found that the ones who start with 'let me help' are usually trustworthy."  
She conspired to follow his lead, but stationed herself in Bodyguard position at the table. Watching others whilst also having a wall at her back.  
Which lead to some even more worrying questions about his own people.  
_Calm. For all I know, it's been perverted 'tradition' care of a controlling government body or something._ He tried to be cool about it. Casual.  
"How much do you know about Changelings?" he asked, absorbing Today's Culinary Experiment.  
"My people have served your people for... forever," said Kyalla. "We were made for them."  
Made? "You're... a member of a tailored species?"  
"Of course, Most Honoured. We are made to be the most trustworthy servants of the Changelings. To act as protectors, or... filters, if you will, between yourself and other Solids."  
"Is that what Changelings call humanoids? Solids?"  
"Yes, of course. Because we are stuck in one shape."  
Odo reached over and gripped the edge of her hand, squeezing gently. "Feels pretty squishy to me," he said as he let go.  
Kyalla looked at her hand as if either afraid it would explode, or that it had suddenly turned into a holy relic.  
"Are my people... afraid of Solids?"  
"They... distrust them," Kyalla admitted. "In all the tales, Changelings are treated with suspicion, paranoia... and eventually, hate."  
Tales again. "You've... never actually *met* a Changeling before me, have you?"  
"No, Most Honoured."  
Class three phaser blast to his Core. "Oh," he sighed.  
"Have I... displeased you?"  
"I'd hoped to know something. Gather some actual *facts*." Another sigh, older than Time. "All I ever seem to find is *stories*."  
Kyalla appeared distressed. "If... you want me to terminate..." A half-gesture.  
"*NO*!" Stares from all around him. Calm. Keep things calm. "That's not necessary. It isn't your fault. It's nobody's fault."  
"How can I atone?"  
"Do you... need... to atone?"  
"*Please*, Most Honoured."  
Damn it, he'd been letting her get away with calling him that for too long. "If you must... then please get yourself checked out by Doctor Bashir. And... give him any factual information you can about Changeling medical care."  
"Me-medical...?" she squeaked.  
"My people, if they still exist, do not exist in a vacuum, Kyalla. There has to be an ecology. And in an ecology, everything feeds off of everything else. Somewhere, there's bound to be some disease or parasite willing to nibble on Changeling flesh. If we knew how to stop them before one finds me, I'd be very grateful."  
Both hands over her heart. Bow. "As you command, Most Honoured."

"Lieutenant?"  
"I thought I'd be at least 'aunty Jadzia' by now," said Dax. She was solving some complicated bio-organics problem via simulations in her lab. "Something's up. What is it?"  
"A newcomer has... attached herself to me. A Vorta named Kyalla. She... claims her species was made. To serve mine."  
"She's a gene slave?"  
"Unfortunately, yes. Her entire culture revolves around serving her 'Most Honoured Changelings'... and I'm the first one she's found."  
Dax winced and whistled backwards.  
"Yes."  
Her next instinct was to pull him onto her lap and hug him fiercely. Even though he was getting tall for such contact. "You must be feeling awful," she said. "Everything we learn about your people makes them look worse and worse."  
"Why won't they come?" he leaned into the embrace. "Half the Gamma Quadrant knows by now. I sent out an open invitation through all the availlable chanels. Those that go back certainly *talk*... Are they hiding? Too afraid of their neighbours to show themselves? Or..." He buried his face in her shoulder with an anguished noise.  
_Or am I the last one?_ Dax finished in her head. All she could really do was hold him close and offer what little comfort she could. Her eyes misted up in spite of herself. "We can't know until we exhaust every lead, Odo. We've barely glimpsed into the Gamma Quadrant. For all we know, they could be the very next race we meet."  
"...doesn't feel like it from here," Odo murmured.  
Dax sighed, knowing exactly how he felt, even though there was almost no frame of reference. "Maybe... you should take a holiday."  
"A holiday," he repeated dubiously.  
"Just some time to yourself. You could go visit Brin... or help out with some of the planting in Rakantha Province... relax at the temple...?" All things within easy location of his 'father's place of residence.   
"I probably *could* get away from it all," he hedged. "But lately, it has a nasty tendancy to follow me around."  
"You could at least try," Dax advised. "I think it might do you good."  
"But what do we do about Kyalla?"

"And this is Commander Sisko. He's my boss' boss."  
It was certainly a weird party. As a first effort went, though, Sisko could appreciate it. Kyalla was more significantly out of her depth. As far as culture shock went, this was throwing her in the deep end.  
Her 'Most Honoured Changeling' chose to defer to an awful lot of superiors.  
"Kyalla," Sisko offered his hand. "Pleased to meet you."  
Kyalla, obviously coached, tentatively greeted him in the human style. "Commander. Why... do you treat M-- Odo... like that?"  
"As an equal?"  
"It demeans him."  
"Only to your eyes," Sisko explained. "Odo's very uncomfortable with his sudden deification. Something I sympathise with. He feels much better as an equal amongst equals."  
Kyalla considered this. "It feels so wrong to address him by name."  
"Or look him in the eye?"  
"Yes."  
"I told Odo the same thing I tell every Bajoran in my command who wants to call me 'Emissary'... I'm only the Emissary on official occasions, and most of the time, I'm just plain old Commander Benjamin Sisko."  
"But... there are no formal occasions for a Changeling, here..."  
"Then, unless he decrees one, Odo is just... Odo."  
"I-- I *can't*. It's... *wrong*..." Kyalla nibbled on an hors d'oeuvre. "Wait. You are the Emissary to the Bajoran Prophets?"  
"Yes."  
"Odo follows the Prophets. Who tell him to follow *you*. And... Chief O'Brien is in your command structure... and Keiko is his wife. As for this... Moryn Adar and Odo's Brin... they are favoured Solids."  
Sisko couldn't help but grin. "Whatever helps you rest easier."  
"Since he respects you... Could you...?"  
"What is it?"  
"Could you... tell him to order me more, and not ask so often?"  
A true gene-slave. Made to want to be ordered around. "Odo was ordered around once. By some very bad people. He doesn't like to give what he didn't like to receive."  
Rage. The fires of revenge burned in her eyes. "Who *dared*--"  
Sisko held up a restraining hand. "It's all in the past," he assured. "Odo prefers to keep it that way."  
She looked over to Odo, perched in the window with Molly and Jake, pointing to a distant ore freighter. "He should hate you. He should hate all of you."  
"I think he's a little more mature than that, Kyalla."  
That made her think. At last.

The first things Klingons did after a disaster was to go out and hunt something down to eat. Humans rebuilt structures, often with the same vulnerabilities as the ones just destroyed, and in the same location. Ferengi sold memorabillia. Bajorans... planted Tokta trees.  
Fast-growing shade, nutritious fruit... and they didn't always need a ladder to retrieve them, either.  
Vedek Tabrin smiled at the queue of children patiently waiting to explore the largest Tokta tree in the immediate area. He'd planted it in the crater left by a stray Cardassian round that had narrowly missed the temple, so many years ago, now.  
A few carried their luggage with them, to meet with family or friends. Even now, shattered families were finding pieces and gathering them together... and the temple helped them meet.  
Tabrin insisted on handing out water or food rolls to the queue, and his insistant assistants persisted in trying to do it for him. It became an agreeable swarm, and cause for laughter amongst the regulars.  
Only one child amongst the many grinned at him and greeted him as, "Brin!"  
"I almost didn't recognise you, you've... grown."  
"Amongst other things," said Odo. All unthinking, he handed the sweet roll in his hand to the next child in line, then joined the assistants in helping feed and water those waiting to climb the tree.  
"Must you?" he said.  
"Isn't a son allowed to help his father?"  
The words fell so easily from that alien mouth. Before today, they had only spent hours at a time, together. He could count and name their encounters. And yet, he was still family, for all their brief contact. He felt a father's love and worry for the boy.  
"All right," he allowed, "But don't start coddling me, eh? I have enough people doing that already."  
Odo nodded, puffing out a brief laugh. "I'm sorry I didn't get down to Bajor earlier," he said. "I just... fell into a kind of routine."  
"I know how that goes," he said. "Even when you were new to me, you struck me as an independant soul."  
"All the same. Emotional ties... have to be re-enforced."  
"So what does this re-enforce?" Tabrin teased, running a finger down the bumps and valleys showing on the side of his son's nose.  
He ducked and hemmed and looked away. Embaressed. "I... thought I might fit in better."  
And wasn't fitting in so very important to everyone his 'age'?  
"And you're making the change gradual? So less people notice?"  
Sigh. "You spotted that?"  
"I remember some of your abrupt adaptions. For you, this is very subtle."  
"I've been learning to appreciate subtle. It's... helping me assimilate."  
"I sense that's become more important to you of late."  
His whole confident demeanor dropped away. "My people are either extinct or monsters... And I don't know which one to wish for."  
Tabrin lent a comforting hand to his shoulder. "In these cases, I'm reminded of some wisdom I found in the Terran archives. Two quotes. The first goes: 'family is more than the people who excreted you' and the second is: 'home is where, when you have to go there, they have to take you in'."  
"You mean you have other shapeshifters running around?" Odo teased. "Should I be jealous?"  
"Just a lot of orphans, Bajoran, Cardassian... or both."  
Odo nodded, understanding. The reached the end of the queue before they reached the end of the food and water, and began the slow circuit to one of the lesser doors. Odo, looking around in naked curiosity, gasped in alarm.  
Tabrin followed his gaze and felt his heart sink. The symbol of those isolationist extremists, the Circle. "On a *temple*," he seethed. "Odo, I do *not* encourage them."  
"I know." Odo put his and on Tabrin's. "You have me for a son. How *could* you?"  
"Antrim? Fetch some cleansers. Odo and I are going to scrub this off."  
"Are you sure?" said the attending monk.  
"Maybe I can shame them into becoming decent people," argued Tabrin.   
Antrim and a few other members of his clucking assistants scurried off. Some of them even volunteered to get cleaning materials.  
He sat on a nearby rock and found Odo ready to cluck. "Not you, too?"  
"Is there something you're not telling me?" asked the young shapeshifter. "About your health?"  
"I was old when I found you," he said, trying to gentle the issue. "I'm even older now. I remember life ruled by the D'jarras... life ruled by the Cardassians... and now... my life is ruled by younger people thinking I should take it easy." He sighed. "I'm not a young man, Odo. But that doesn't mean I don't have a lot of life in me." His hands had been gnarled by his life, first as a scientist, then a miner and other assorted hard work under the Cardassians. Even his time in the temple refused to take all the roughness or the curl out of them. It's why he caressed his alien son with the back of his hand. "I just have a little lung trouble from my time in the mines. It's nothing to worry about."  
"Promise me?" begged Odo.  
"I'll try my hardest to live my full two hundred years and then some."  
Odo was reassured by that.

The wall was clean, at least. Brin sat in the shade, red about the face. Odo had turned one of his hands into a generous fan to blow cool air over his adopted father. A worried acolyte hovered nearby with water and cooling cloths.  
"This is what I get," Brin panted, "for trying to keep up with the young."  
"I was trying to get ahead of you," said Odo. "So you wouldn't be overworked. I'm sorry, Brin..."  
"I should have guessed when you started scrubbing with four arms," he reached out to caress his son. "I'm sorry, too, kitling."  
"Just get better," said Odo.  
There was a murmuring crowd, a respectful distance away. All were more-or-less staring at Odo. Some stared with pity. Some glared with hatred. The remaining few looked in an odd mix of confusion and disgust.  
"Just go forward in all your beliefs," said Brin.  
"Pardon?" said the young shapeshifter.  
"The best and only defense against people who glare and mutter," he smiled. "There must be no regrets, no tears, no anxieties... just go forward in all your beliefs, and you'll prove that I haven't been mistaken in mine."  
"It doesn't sound easy."  
"Anyone who tells you life is easy is trying to sell you something." He laughed. "I'm feeling well enough to move into the temple. There's some cooler rooms, there. Help me up, son."  
Murmur, murmur, murmur, went the crowd.  
Odo glanced over his shoulder at them once, but ignored them as he helped his father up.  
There were cooler rooms, and scant medications taken alongside worried glances amongst the attending mini-horde. Odo spent an hour just listening to the old man breathe. Eventually, the wheezing faded, and a snore took over.  
_Just go forward in all your beliefs..._ Odo patted Brin's hand and kissed his brow. He found an acolyte waiting - hovering, actually - outside the door. "Is there anything that needs fixing?"  
There was always something that needed fixing. Sometimes, two or more of a similar device were sacrificed to make a new, working hybrid. He knew there was a satisfaction in making things work. He never expected cheers when he got the temple's old replicator working.  
And when he ran out of things he could fix - or kludge - he joined the endless stream of lesser-thans doing equally endless and mostly thankless but necessary scut-work.  
He didn't find peace, since there were always the almost-inaudible murmurs containing words like 'offworlder' or 'changeling'... or just 'shapeshifter'. What Odo did find was a sense of accomplishment. Something that he could do got *done*.  
And then, when he felt his shape wear on him at long last (he was almost up to eighteen hours, now) Odo took his leave and returned to Brin's room, where he and his pail rested.

"What are you doing?"  
Bariel looked over his shoulder to find the alien boy, still clad in his grey-and-green uniform, watching with naked interest. "Let me guess," he said, "You've run out of things to do."  
"I've run out of things I'm caable of fixing," he allowed. "You looked like you were doing something... interesting. I thought I could help."  
"Well, I could always use another pair of hands pulling weeds."  
"What's a weed?"  
It was an education for both of them. First, in the very nature of weeds, and second in the very nature of Bajor. For the first time in a lifetime, he found himself looking at life through alien eyes.  
He understood what it must be like for an offworlder with no place to go, trapped in a system that had no positive emotion for anyone in that social pigeon-hole. It was more than just the words he used, but the delicate care he took in transferring seedling weeds not classified as 'feral' to a pot of soil for later re-planting.  
"There's more than we could ever use."  
"I'm certain someone could use them somewhere," said Odo. "Everything deserves a chance... to be where its wanted."  
So they wound up offering seedlings to those who came to meet their families. Bareil saw the hatred for the offworlder in the eyes of so many, saw how very few would accept a plant from Odo's hands. Some of them made discrete hex-signs against him. Others weren't that subtle. Children stared. Adults pretended they weren't staring.  
Through it all, Odo soldiered on as if all was perfectly normal.  
The cracks showed after the plants were gone and most of the Temple's population was practicing meditation. Bariel was about to isolate himself when he caught the alien boy in one of the Reflection Room. Staring at himself in the still water. Twisting himself this way and that.  
He watched for a few minutes before announcing, "The reflecting pools aren't meant as mirrors of reality, Odo."  
He slumped. "Sorry."  
"Yet I sense you were seeking answers."  
Odo looked up at him. "Are you familliar with the Uncanny Valley?"  
Bariel thought hard. "Is that anywhere near Kailunne?"  
"It's a metaphor. When it comes to... imitating humanoid reality... The closer one gets to perfection - the more disturbing the imitation is to the humanoids viewing it. Maybe so many Bajorans dislike me because I'm... so very deep inside it."  
"No," said Bareil. "They dislike you because they've spent their lifetimes fighting to get offworlders away from their planet... and yet - you're still here."  
He slumped even further. "Oh."  
Oh, indeed. He couldn't *not* be alien. Just like the half-Cardassian by-blows left at the temple... some still stained with their birth-blood. Or the Cardassian orphans left behind because no soldier thought them worth the effort of rescue. Or the rare, alien children whose parents got swept up in the war. True, the Federation was attempting to assist in finding homes for all those lost souls, but...  
For some, just like this one, Bajor was the only home he knew.  
"I think you need to meditate," said Bariel. "I'll show you where you can go." He showed the boy to the meditation room used by the younger generation who, through no fault of their own, were becoming permanent residents of the temple. There, Bajoran meditated right next to Cardassian, or a halfbreed, with no trace of hostility.

"There's so many," Odo whispered.  
"All can seek the Prophets. I think it's time you sought them, too."  
He had before. "I tried. I don't think they answered."  
"They don't always answer," said Bariel. "That's why we try again."  
Odo copied the posture of his neighbours, closed his eyes... and breathed.  
Peace decended on him like gentle snow. Like petals from the Tokta tree. He shapeshifted within himself, almost unconsciously. First, the delicate branches of the lungs, halving and halving again until the flowers of the alveoli. Then the twining capilliaries and endless tangle of the blood vessels. The heart. The things the vessels fed. Brain. Stomach. Liver. Kidneys. Bladder. Guts. All the numerous fibres of the muscles and the intricate lacework of bone and ligament and the pores of the skin. Hair and seperating his clothing from the body. Every detail.  
_We see you,_ whispered a voice in his mind. _We've always seen you. You are of Bajor._  
His new eyes stung. Wetness slid down his cheek. He opened his eyes to find he was completely alone... except for Brin, sitting patiently on the edge of the mandala.  
"I didn't want to disturb you." Brin smiled. "You've been here for hours."  
"I'm not even tired," said Odo. He still felt a peculiar kind of elation. The very sensation of blood flowing though his veins was like a miracle. How could they stand being like this all the time? He stared at his hands. Fingerprints. And palm prints. He'd never bothered before.  
"You've made yourself completely Bajoran," said Brin. "How are you?"  
"It feels... strange." He sniffed. Smell! He could smell. The air was dry and dusty and carried a faint whiff of spices. He could detect the hot oilyness of the wax. The sweat in the air from the people who passed through. How did they not get lost in their senses? Unbidden noise came from within. He'd made the stomach empty, and now it protested without prompting.  
"I'm making toka bread. Want to help? Bakers get to test the batches."  
Odo's new stomach agreed with him.

"What are you doing?"  
Kira looked up at the child leaning on the railing. "The pathway is crooked."  
He tilted his head. "Looks fine from here."  
"Yes. But then I go over there, and it doesn't. Just when I think I've fixed it, I find another angle and..."  
"It looks crooked," said the kid. He ducked under the railing and joined her in the water. "Need help? I like to fix things."  
Kira laughed. "You're welcome to try, Kitling. Gimmie a few more days and I could tear up this whole garden."  
"One Bajoran to do what several thousand Cardassian soldiers failed at? I don't believe you're that destructive."  
"Give it time. I ruin everything I touch." She stood, looked at her handiwork. Tested it. "Now it's wobbly."  
The kid, already crouching, fitted a rock from the stream into the stepping-stone's structure and stopped the wobble cold.  
"There," said the kid. "Better."  
And that's when the Circle struck.

Odo was bloody furious. And stuffed in a sack with Kira.  
Personally, he could think of several hundred places he'd prefer to be with Major Kira in, but that wasn't the real problem.  
He had no idea how long he could stay this Bajoran. Sooner or later, they were all going to find out.  
She was unconscious. Breathing fine. Heartbeat good. Pagh? As close to 'at peace' as she was likely to get.  
He'd just read a pagh for the first time in his life.  
His normal levels of excitement were understandably muted.  
If he shapeshifted in front of her, it would all be over. They landed uncomfortably in an enclosed space. Motors whirred to life. Not smooth like a shuttle ride. Bumpy. Was this a road vehicle?  
Prophets knew that there were enough of the old relics lying around. The resistance could get pretty creative when it came to getting around. And now, these people were, too.  
Odo kept track of the turns by counting how many times Kira's inert form lurched over him or slid subtly away. He automatically counted the seconds. He had to. Knowing exactly how long he had in his form saved him multiple embarrassments. He could, if necessary, trace his path all the way back to the temple.  
But more importantly, he could also tell where they were going.

Kyalla was almost literally beside herself. She was shaking so hard, there almost seemed to be two of her. "if I had been there to protect him. If I had followed him. If I was there..."  
"Then the Circle would have one more hostage on their hands," said Sisko. "According to Vedek Tabrin, Odo was looking more... realistically Bajoran than usual. They would have scooped him up to prevent early discovery. They'll leave him alone, because they assume he's an innocent."  
"My Most Honored Changeling is not collateral damage!"  
"I never said we counted him as such. Trust me. We are looking for the both of them."  
"I will find him! I sought him out before I knew where he was, I can seek him out again."  
"I'll arrange a security detail for your safety."  
"My safety is not important. The only one who matters is the Most Honoured Changeling."  
"I'm sure Odo would see it differently."

They had him in a cage, within easy sight of Major Kira. She was chained to a wall, arms over her head, feet barely able to touch the ground. There was nothing in this room that couldn't be used to hurt someone. Even him, stuck in the cage, could hurt Major Kira.  
"Sorry," he said.  
"I'm sorry you got dragged along. My name's Kira."  
So. His Bajoran guise was really that convincing. "I know. Major Kira Nerys, of the space station at the wormhole."  
"...how?"  
Odo focussed on relaxing. Stretched himself into his pseudo-adult shape, right out of the cage and next to her. "Sorry to deceive you, Major. But I felt I was safer... being overlooked." And without leave, shapeshifted her locks open.  
"Thanks," she whispered. "You take that door, I've got this one. Knock 'em out quiet, right?"  
Odo nodded, taking his assigned position.  
This is it. Crunch time. The first time he'd be purposely harming another being. He felt bad enough, any time he delivered accidental bruises to his sparring partners. One entered his assigned door.  
Repetative reflex took over. Don't think. Act. Chop to the neck with the side of the hand, so. Knee to the solar plexus, thus. Flip them onto the ground. Disarm and hold. There was a nerve cluster... There. Pinch it correctly and the victim would suffer only peaceful slumber for an hour or so. Get it wrong... And they would suffer for that same time span.  
Odo offered a silent prayer to the Prophets and squeezed...  
And breathed again when the man only slumped in his arms. Odo divested him of his mask and coverallsin, then noticed the weapon.  
"Major," he hissed. "Look at this."  
"It's a Cardassian phaser rifle, so what? We had thousands of captured weapons like it."  
"How many of them were brand new?"  
Kira made a face. He could tell she was going to argue about this, but they never got the chance. Another swarm of Circle extremists swept into the room. Odo used his liberated weapon like a billy-club, knocking opponents down rather than shooting. He would not cause lasting harm, by accident nor design.   
One got too close, evading his guard and grappling with him for the weapon. Tumbling with him to and fro on the dirt floor.  
Couldn't let him get the weapon, because he *would* shoot. Couldn't shoot him because it would tear his own Pagh to shreds. If he could grow a third arm, maybe he could try that pinch again...  
There was a noise, and a nimbus of white light.  
He saw the soul flee from behind his attacker's eyes.  
And then the man was a dead weight on top of him.  
Odo shrank in on himself, literally. All the way down to the child form Kira dug out of the rubble that used to be the science centre. Maybe a little further. Let the weight push him down. All the way into the ground.  
He deserved it.  
Someone had shot this man, because they thought he was in danger.  
"Most Honoured!"  
Kyalla? Was there some chemical in this dirt that gave him waking nightmares?  
Someone rolled the body off him, scooped him up into their arms. "Most Honoured, I've found you! I've saved you!"  
He could only stare at the cooling body.  
"How... How many?"  
Kira, alive and well in the background, shook her head. She had no idea, and a guarding eye on both doors.  
"How... many?"  
"We have to go," said Kira. She had a liberated phaser rifle in each hand. Good. Proof would walk out of here.  
So would the corpse on his conscience.  
So would the others he passed on the way out. He counted each one. Memorized every detail he could see. Felt the weight of each body, pressing... pressing down on him and making him feel heavier. He tried to compensate for Kyalla. Though he despised what she'd done, she'd done it for his sake. She didn't deserve punishment. It was his fault that she followed him. He got entangled in this mess, not her. So he made himself lighter with every body he saw.  
By the time they reached fresh air, he was essentially foam with a faint, delicate tracery of crystal lattice for bones. He could squash or shatter at a wrong touch... And he was starting to wish he would.  
Kyalla, Prophets damn it, was as careful and gentle as someone with a Fa'ree nest.

Relieved though he was to see his missing people, there was still the issue of other Circle members seeking revenge. "And how did you get hold of two new Cardassian phaser rifles?"  
"Every resistance movement has a cache of Cardassian weapons," said Kira.  
Odo stirred. He looked like hell. "No. No. These are newer than that. These are newer than the end of the Occupation."  
"How can you know?"  
"My Most Honoured--" Odo put his hand over Kyalla's mouth.  
"When I was in the Lab," Odo said. "I saw every new issue of weapons before they hit the rest of the Occupation force. Cardassia wanted the Labs under the best security. The best they ever got is version four point eight. This phaser pistol is version five point two."  
Kira boggled at him. "You can tell that?"  
"I spent a lot of time looking at Cardassian weapons." He slumped back against Kyalla's shoulder.  
"Bring them up," said Sisko. "Evidence of Cardassian interference is serious business."  
"My Most Honoured Changeling needs aid," said Kyalla. "Something is... wrong. He's far too light.".  
Odo didn't move from his slump. "Take me to Brin? Please?"  
"Nearest shuttle port's on the way," lied Kira. "We'll both take him."  
"Understood," he said. He did understand. Their shaky relationship must've been bolstered by their shared experience.  
He knew where they were. Knowing which one was in worse shape from their adventure was going to be a problem for later.

"Careful," cautioned the alien.  
Tabrin could sense the frailty of his pagh, and was only mildly surprised by the lightness of his body. "What's the matter, kitling? Tell your Papa, hm?"  
"...they died... they died..."  
He risked reading his son's pagh. Such massive grief and guilt. "His soul is heavy," he said. "What would weigh on him so much?"  
"There was some collateral damage involved in his rescue," reported the alien.  
"That collateral damage was almost one hundred dead Bajorans! Did you *have* to kill them?"  
"They threatened my Most Honoured, their lives were forfeit."  
"...dead," whispered Odo, "...just because I was there... Eighty-four... Dead..."  
Tabrin held his alien son as tightly as he dared, and glared down the alien female with all the patriarchal fury he could summon. "Young lady," he iced, "before this day, my son had not taken a single life - of any species. Do you have any idea what you have done to him?"  
"I... saved him," she said.  
"She's a gene-slave," said Kira. "For all we know, this is in her programming."  
"My people made her to kill," whimpered Odo.  
"Only in defense," she said. "If I have displeased you, Most Honoured, I will terminate."  
"*NO*!" The sudden, angry roar even made Tabrin jump. Odo leaped out of his arms to grab the woman's collar and drag her down. "If I could make you feel their weight like I do, I would, but you are going to live to learn from this. I want you to track down their names. Trace their families... and sincerely apologize."  
"Apologize?" she was shocked and appalled.  
"Yes, apologize. Find out who they were, what jobs they held. Discover how large their families were and why they needed the people you killed. And when you finally learn to regret what you've done... *then* you can begin to apologize to me."  
"Most Honoured?"  
"Don't you dare call me that again," he heaved himself away from her. "All my life, I sought to harm no other living thing... and now, because of me, eighty-four people lie dead. That's eighty-four souls on my conscience and they are very... heavy." He struggled back to Tabrin. "They're so very heavy..."  
Tabrin comforted his son. "You're not responsible for their deaths, Odo."  
"I'm responsible for Kyalla..." he explained. "Her people are gene-slaves to mine... What she does... reflects on me..."  
At least he was a proper weight when Tabrin picked him up to comfort him. "There, now, kitling... ssshhh... She was ignorant. The task you set her may open her eyes."  
Kyalla moved to touch Odo's shoulder, but Tabrin flinched him away and glared her down. "He gave you a task. Go do it," he iced.  
"You cannot order me."  
"I can," said Odo. "Go away and do what you're told." He shuddered in Tabrin's arms.  
The old Vedek caressed his alien son. "I wish I could heal your broken heart, kitling. I wish there was something I could do to help you feel better... But I can help you mourn those strangers. We'll pray to the Prophets for them, together."  
Odo managed a nod.  
Tabrin bowed to Kira, cut Kyalla dead, and carried his son away to a place of peace.

Kyalla had likewise found a place of peace and solitude. She held an otherwise-ordinary bracelet up to her mouth. "Nanny to nursery. Nanny to nursery. Respond please."  
Crackling. "Nursery reads you. Report."  
"Problem Child has given first orders," she whispered. "Still counter to Mater's wishes. Problem child treasures bad influences. I need orders."  
Static. "Continue undercover, Nanny. Carry out Problem Child's commands and write home immediately on resolution. Nursery out."  
They didn't bother to ask what the lost child's orders had been. They didn't need to. They were a Changeling's orders and they had to be obeyed.  
Kyalla found a console and began scouring the nets for anything about the Circle and the recently dead.

Keiko almost didn't notice that Odo had returned from his holiday. She'd heard, like the others, that the Circle and its acts of violence had been part of a Cardassian scheme to throw Bajor back into chaos. She'd also heard that Odo had been key in uncovering that part of it.  
He was quieter. More subdued, if any such thing could be said about the very reserved shapeshifter. It was if he carried a great weight on his shoulders and nothing was going to shift it.  
Personally, she was glad to see his green and grey techie's uniform in her class. She'd missed him.  
"Today, we're looking at the influence of music on culture, and culture's influence on music. Many longer pieces are culturally significant, like _Juranta i' Kryol_ from Bajor, or _Faust_ from Earth..."  
Most of the kids were bored, she knew. They were too young to appreciate opera. Yet Odo hung on her every word with a quiet kind of hunger. She moved on to more modern pieces her audience would be familiar with, and showed how the lyrics fed on cultural shorthand in order to be understood.  
Songs passed on history, even when the history had been buried. Children's play songs often echoed dark and grimy pasts.  
Or not so *very* much in the past, like the popular Bajoran ditty _We Love You, Mr Spoonhead_... which, to Keiko's internal shame, always mentally scanned to an ancient Earth opus known as _Merry Go Round Broke Down_.  
Odo tentatively raised a hand.  
"Yes?"  
"I've noted some common themes in certain pieces. Love, revenge, loss... Even though the cultures are different, the experiences remain similar."  
Profound. "Very insightful, Odo," she smiled. "Yes, even though the cultures surrounding a sentient may be different, basic emotional experiences are the same - pain, loss, envy, the need for revenge... As well as joy, fellowship, friendship, love... In essence, all sentient life is the same."  
Odo looked even more depressed about that than ever. He didn't volunteer any more information, and just quietly researched anything that came in via the Gamma Quadrant since the last time he'd checked. This time, he was taking notes.  
Keiko sneaked a look via her monitor. He was attempting to psychoanalyze his absent people by the stories other people told. Repetitive and isolated traits. In a side-window, he had lyrics from some Vorta songs. Trying to infer what his people were like by what they wanted out of their... genetically-engineered servants.  
It was easier to think that than 'gene slaves'.  
And hard to not look down on a people that made them.  
But then, for all she knew, genetic engineering didn't have the lasting stigma in the Gamma Quadrant that Keiko was familiar with in the Alpha Quadrant. Maybe people made servants, over there, all the time.  
However sickening she personally found the thought. Or, judging by the look on Odo's face, however sickening it was to him, too.  
Keiko read a few of those lyrics herself. According to the Vorta, Changelings were gods. Capable of any miracle. And it wasn't like Starfleet had an advice book on sudden onset deification.  
Vedek Tabrin couldn't help him. Not completely. Commander Sisko was essentially Emissary whenever Bajor needed a spiritual figurehead. Or whenever Sisko needed another fancy title to impress folks with. The only people Keiko knew of who had any experience with godhood were the kinds of people one didn't want contact with.  
Because they were... well... gods. And they could actually produce miracles.  
He was still a minor, and that much responsibility weighed heavily on him.  
That was why she asked him to stay back.  
"Did I do something else wrong?"  
Such a telling choice of words. "I can tell something's troubling you. If you need to talk..."  
"Talk can't help. The more I hear about my people, the less I want to be one of them. I don't want to be an instrument of casual murder."  
"So *tell* Kyalla." Keiko looked tom the entryway. "Where *is* she, anyway?"  
"Back on Bajor with Brin. Working to notify the families of the dead."  
"Does she understand?"  
"Brin told her off. He said, 'life is as sacred to him, as he is to you. If you have any love in your body, then you will act as ashamed as he is that all this death has happened.' It was... interesting... To watch her face change." Odo shook his gaze out of the past. "Is there a difference? Between acting sorry and being sorry?"  
She hugged him. He seemed to need it. "Only time can tell. If she changes her behavior, then she's genuinely sorry. If she stays the same..."  
He disentangled himself. "Thankyou, Mrs O'Brien. I have... duties."  
True enough, there was a queue of supplicants outside the door. His step got heavier as he got nearer. Some had a look of horrified realization, as if noticing just now that he was very young. Some looked worried that they might have to address their requests through her.  
Even though her heart was breaking for him, she packed up and went home.

The woman was kissing his feet. "Please stop that," he murmured.  
She froze as if expecting a death blow. "Have I displeased--"  
"No. No. It... it isn't necessary. Really." Either this one had slipped by official channels, or she didn't want to believe the unfortunate truth. "I'm young, for a Changeling. Honest. I didn't mean that I wasn't going to help you. I just... I'm not *able* to do what you want me to do."  
Devastation in her eyes. He'd just killed her last hope.  
"I'm sorry. I don't know how to give you your old life back. But I can help you find a new life." In fact, he had a network of Gamma Quadrant refugees set up to help other refugees. All he really had to do was put her profile out there and watch the offers come flooding in.  
"That's almost exactly what the Rok'hari said. I didn't want to believe..."  
"I have no memory of my people," he said. "I've never learned how to perform miracles."  
"Then you are no God," she leaped to her feet and punched at him with some piece of jewelry.  
He let his middle liquefy, then adjusted his shape and mass to flip her and roll her. He re-formed into his usual shape while pinning her arms to her back.  
"We agree," he said, "but murder is not the answer."  
True to form, his 'uncle' Moryn and his second, Boyajian, were there in seconds. "Another assault?"  
"Attempted assault." He let Boyajian take over her custody. "I'll need Doctor Bashir to analyze that little bauble she attacked me with, just in case." He found his gaze drawn to the temple. If he wasn't a Changeling any more... "I'm going to Be a Bajoran." 

Yareth had followed him because she wanted to apologize again for what she had unleashed on him. Or what she had a hand in unleashing on him, because her father had been just as vocal to the traders from the Gamma Quadrant as she had been with their children. Then, when she caught up with him, he was so deep into prayer and meditation that she hadn't dared to disturb him.  
That was when she witnessed the miracle.  
He sat as still as a stone, she was used to that. The miracle was that he slowly became more Bajoran as she watched. His smooth features defined themselves. The delicate folds of the nose began to become clear.  
He looked more real. He even sprouted the fine peach fuzz of hairs that mammalian sentients bore as proof of their evolution. His pulse jumped in his throat. He breathed... even his hair appeared more real than it had before.  
He stood, found her with his piercing blue eyes. "Go ahead and tell them. I'm not a Changeling, any more. I'm just another Bajoran, and I intend to stay that way until they stop."

**Author's Note:**

> Kind of hanging up in the air, here, alas. Suggestions on where/how to take this are gratefully appreciated.


End file.
